Twenty-five-year-old Lewis Bates has emerged as the favourite to win this year’s Australian Rally Championship after a dominant victory in the Adelaide Hills Rally.
Driving his Toyota GR Yaris AP4, Bates went into the rally trailing his 27-year-old brother, Harry, by 65-points, but the rally win and fastest time on the rally-ending Power Stage has seen him take the title lead.
The Adelaide Hills Rally was a unique mixed-surface event based at The Bend Motorsport Park in regional South Australia, using parts of the circuit and its access roads, as well as shire road stages in the Adelaide Hills.
Following his recent drive at Rally New Zealand, Harry Bates was expected to dominate in his factory Toyota, as he has for the past few seasons, but it was Lewis who came out of the blocks firing, winning the first six stages of the rally.
The older Bates brother fought back once the rally headed for the faster, more open shire roads stages to take the lead, but it was short lived.
On the following stage a cracked exhaust manifold caused an engine fire that put paid to Bates’ challenge, handing the lead back to Lewis.
Rejoining for day two, Harry was targeting victory on the final Power Stage, but again he had to give best to his brother on the tarmac, losing the stage by just 0.1 of a second.
The Power Stage defeat to his brother meant that Harry couldn’t stop him from getting maximum points either.
With each competitor able to drop their worst round from the championship’s seven (six with Rally Queensland’s cancellation), it gives Lewis a 31 point advantage over Harry, meaning that if he finishes second at the final event next month, the title will be his.
Harry will need to win the rally and the Power Stage and hope that his brother finishes lower down the leaderboard.
Elsewhere in South Australia, the first generation Toyota Yaris AP4 of Richie Dalton secured stage wins and a brilliant second place, ahead of young star, Troy Dowel, in a Hyundai i20 G4.
Daniel Gonzalez was fourth in a Skoda Fabia R5, while the top five was rounded out by Jamie Luff in a Subaru Impreza WRX, also taking out the Production Cup for the event.
Max McRae made another appearance in the championship in an ex-Dean Herridge Subaru Impreza WRX, but crashed out on the first shire road stage of the rally.
FIA Rally Star winner, Taylor Gill, was leading the Production Cup charge early on, but driveshaft and coil pack problems dented his hopes of another victory.
The rally started on Friday night with four all-tarmac runs around The Bend’s GT circuit, before continuing on Saturday over a mix of tarmac and gravel.
On Sunday morning the heavens opened, dumping rain on the stages and causing some to be cancelled and others to be shortened, adding to the challenge of a rally that was already polarizing for some competitors.
With just one round to go, the Australian Rally Championship now heads to Coffs Harbour on November 25 and 26 where the brothers Bates will fight it out for ultimate bragging rights.
The rally also counts as the Grand Finale of the Asia Pacific Rally Championship, with Hayden Paddon and other Kiwi drivers expected to compete.
The rally will use many of the roads made famous by Rally Australia in recent years including stages in the Newry and Wedding Bells forest.
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