As the dust settled on the final 9.1 km Malvern Hills Rd stage of this year’s NZ Silver Fern Rally north-west of Christchurch last Saturday week (Sat Nov 26) fast-rising young British marathon rally ace James Ford (Mk 2 Ford Escort RS1800) realised he could finally relax, confident in the knowledge that he and co-driver Neil Shanks had won.
In fact, in the time it took for the pair to make their way back to event HQ in suburban Christchurch, the results were official; Ford & Scotsman Shanks indeed winning the 2022 NZ Silver Fern Rally in a time of 9:00:23.9, 3m29.5s up on local hero Jeff Judd and his co-driver Stephane Prevot from Belgium (Mk 2 Ford Escort RS1800), then in third and fourth places respectively, were NZ-domiciled Scott, Ally MacKay and his co-driver Michael Hendry (from Scotland in the MacKay family’s Mk1 Ford Escort RS1600) and Wanaka ace Allan Dippie and co-driver Paul Coghill (Porsche 911 S).
Leading home a veritable conga line of made-to-order Mk2 Ford Escort RS1800s from fifth to eighth places, meanwhile, was regular event attendee Simon Tysoe from the UK. Three of the four had Kiwi co-drivers calling the corners; Rocky Hudson for Simon Tysoe in fifth place, Ross Moodie for Aussie Keith Callinan (sixth) and Donna Elder for legendary East African Safari Rally ace Frank Tundo from Kenya who finished seventh.
In eighth place came Phil Squires from the UK and Welsh co-driver Alun Cook in (yet another Mk2 Ford Escort RS1800), while rounding out the top 10 were two very different Toyotas.
One, a KP61 Starlet owned and driven by Auckland motorsport all-rounder Steve Cox, and co-driven by Laurie Brenssell from Hamilton, survived an unscheduled engine change and (because of it) an event maximum 20 minute time penalty, to end up with a class win as well as a spot in the top 10 (9th) overall.
The other Toyota to complete a class-winning/top 10 overall ‘double’ was the classic RWD AE86 Corolla coupe of visiting Brit Tony Jardine and Kiwi co-driver Warwick Martin.
Two of the other international combinations running Mk2 Ford Escort RS1800-style cars also finished this year, with Welsh pair Ron Morgan and Marc Clatworthy in 11th place, and UK duo Graham Samuel & Tom Ryan, 12th.
In terms of the event as a whole it’s hard not to feel for local favourite, Jeff Judd & co-driver Stephane Prevot (who won 27 of the 43 special stages run but could only manage to finish second overall) thanks to an incident 7.5km into the 24.28km Falla Burn Rd stage (west of Milton) on Wednesday morning which saw the pair’s Ford Escort slip off the road and become stuck fast where it landed. All thanks, said Judd, to a slow puncture.
“A simple 3-right at an intersection and we missed our turn-in with bugger-all grip on our left front as the tyre was either flat or going down, we slid wide just missing the fence but the tyre with bugger all air in it was punched off the rim
“Unknown to us we took off and over the crest to a right hander about 400m away, but the car just understeered into the grassy side of the road and got stuck.”
Had they been able to simply drive away from the incident site the pair would no doubt still be chuckling about it along ‘dodging a(nother) bullett’ lines.
This time, however, it was ‘no joke.
Not only did the 24-minute maximum stage time penalty Judd & Prevot receive for their trouble, mean that the pair lost their hard-earned early event lead to arch-rivals – and eventual winners – James Ford & Neil Shanks, but also that Ford & Shanks now held a virtually unassailable lead (of 10 + minutes) over Judd & Prevot in the race to win the 2022 NZ Silver Fern Rally title.
“The upshot of it all,’ said Judd, ‘was that we lost over 10 minutes to James and Neil on Wednesday, “so if we want to even be considered as a threat this year we’ve got our work cut out trying to reduce the deficit.”
Reduce it they did however, from the 10mins 38.7 seconds it had blown out to by lunchtime on Wednesday to 8mins 12secs by time the field reached Invercargill that night.
The gains were not in the same league (less than a minute) on the Thursday, despite the day kicking off with the event’s longest single stage, the 71km Stout Road, and going on to set a new benchmark (188 km) for the sheer number of special stage km an event organiser can fit into a day.
Come Friday, and Judd & Prevot were finally able to focus on their raw speed; with predictable – if in retrospect – bittersweet results.
“We loved the more open stages and had some great gains over the day taking 2min 30 sec off the lead that James and Neil had,” commented Judd.
“It’s been a very enjoyable Rally so far, so the goal now is definitely bring it home to reward our team of awesome supporters and hopefully celebrate the challenge of this incredible event with all involved.”
Which, as it turned out, is exactly how this year’s NZ Silver Fern Rally panned out, with internationals James Ford and co-driver Neil Shanks going on to successfully complete all five stages on the final day of competition (Sat Nov 26) to claim a popular victory in this year’s event
And despite effectively capitulating the night before, local hero Jeff Judd and co-driver Stephane Prevot came out ‘all guns blazing’ on the final morning of the event, going on to win all five of Saturday’s stages, as well as pulling a further minute and three-quarters out of long-time event leaders Ford & Shanks.
Not – quite – enough to prompt a massive panic in the Ford/Shanks’ ‘camp’; but more than enough to keep driver and co-driver fully-engaged and on their toes.
The Challenge Cup part of the event (for more modern 2WDs plus mix n’match modded older models) ended up being run and – and as it turns out won – by Christchurch-based front-wheel-drive rally specialist Karl Celeste and co-driver(s) Andrew Oakley (1st shift) and Matt Bailey (2nd shift) in a late-ish model fwd. Toyota Corolla Levin.
While the Celeste Corolla was by no means the quickest entered in the Challenge Cup, it definitely proved to be the most reliable, crossing the finish line in a time of 9:22:30.8, almost 45 minutes ahead of Aussie veteran Ed Mulligan and his co-driver David Travis (BMW E30) who were second, plus a good hour & 10mins up on the crashed/repaired and re-entered Toyota GT86 of Hamilton duo Brent Taylor and Chris Ramsay which was third!
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