Some you win, some you lose.

In my last report on the antics of the outrageous purple Escort, I regretted how a “1st in Class” had always eluded us. Then, as luck would have it, we achieved one on the very next event: July’s, Woods Ranges Stages! Aberystwyth & DMC made a good job of running the event, which fell on a sunny Saturday. Although a little slippery early on, the stages dried quickly and we were rewarded not only with our highest class position but also our best overall (8th). There was some stiff competition, so we were jubilant to make the back pages of Motorsport News: simple pleasures, eh?

With such recent experience on the Ranges, we looked well placed for a repeat on the DPS Stages at the venue in August. Alas, despite a fairly faultless drive and no glitches, our efforts were all in vain. As we approached the finish of SS9, a Peugeot 205, which had rolled earlier, failed on the narrow spectator area immediately ahead of us, blocking the road. It wasn’t their fault, of course but the delay and confusion in marshals and spectators moving it to clear a path through the tyres, meant we just had to wait there in excess of half a minute; destroying our whole day’s work. When we returned dejected to service, we were relieved to find Nick, newest recruit to the Service Crew, had recorded the whole incident on his Mobile phone camera. Its on-board timer clearly showed the delay to be at least 31secs, so we presented the “video evidence” to the Clerk of the Course, who initially seemed willing to compensate us. However, as the time difference would have given us 3rd in Class, that would have been controversial; so our protests finally fell on deaf ears. “That’s rallying”, as they say …but very frustrating!

Purple Moose Brewery, our sponsors, have been vying with us for awards: actually, they’re doing rather better. All four regular beers have won awards recently and they too got a “first in class” when Glaslyn was voted Top Best Bitter in the UK by CAMRA. I can tell you, a good few pints were downed to drown the team’s sorrows after the DPS!

However, there’s been some good news since. My driver, Jonathan “Wol” Whalley, married his fiancé, Becky Kitchin from Blaenau Ffestiniog, on 15th Sept. I was “Best Man” (he must be short of mates), which allowed for plenty of rallying anecdotes in the speech. Becky is a keen horse rider, so to remind him with which sport his loyalties lie, we’d presented a cartoon at the Stag Do. Captioned “Are you still in control?” it featured Wol in a sideways Escort rally car and on a horse. Hopefully he will awake to see this each day and the red cross under the horse will remind him not to take-up show-jumping instead! …And the ribbon-festooned, wedding limo’ that carried the Groom to his fate and provided transport away from the proceedings for the Happy Couple? …The Purple Moose Escort Mk2 of course!

Pete Dennis.