|
|
 |
THREE IN A ROW FOR PROUDLY SOUTH AFRICAN NISSAN MOTORSPORT TEAM
SOUTH AFRICA OFF ROAD CHAMPIONSHIP
Botswana - June 12, 2004
|
Nissan Motorsport celebrated a third successive outright victory in round three of the ABSA Off Road Championship in Botswana this past weekend when Hannes Grobler and Richard Leeke won the Toyota 1000 Desert Race for the third year in succession in their class T Proudly South African Nissan Hardbody V6, 30m 3s ahead of Neil Woolridge and Kenny Skjoldhammer in a class T Ford Ranger V6 after two days and 1000 km of racing.
Nissan also won class D (for six cylinder near-standard production vehicles) with a hard-earned third overall by Alfie Cox and Ralph Pitchford in their Nissan Motorsport prepared Arnold Chatz Cars Hardbody, a slim 13 seconds ahead of Mark Cronje and Chris Birkin in a Toyota Hilux.
11 of the original 40 starters classified as finishers. Six of these competed in class E, with Nissan privateers and brothers Jurie and Andre du Plessis sixth in class and 11th overall in their BB Auto Hardbody.
After Friday's 32 km prologue, it was Nissan team manager Glyn Hall, deputising for an injured Giniel de Villiers, and co-driver Francois Jordaan who started Saturday's 500 km section from pole position in their Proudly South African Nissan Hardbody, followed by team-mates Grobler and Leeke, Ford's Woolridge and Skjoldhammer and Duncan Vos and Hennie ter Stege in the third Proudly South African Nissan.
Hall, SA rally champion in 1990, was making his first-ever appearance in an off road race after retiring from active motor racing in 1992. Hall's delight at winning the prologue, which determines the starting order for the race proper, was short-lived, however, as the Nissan ground to a halt just 15 km into the route when an aluminium power steering pipe union burst.
"It felt good while it lasted," said a rueful Hall.
For Grobler and Leeke it was a case of business as usual. The reigning national champions have now won the last two rounds of this year's championship and 11 of the last 14 national championship off-road races.
"We had absolutely no problems with the car," said a delighted Grobler at the end of 15 hours of hard driving. "But, for the first time in my 27-year off-road racing and rallying career, I was sick on an event. From Saturday I suffered from an upset stomach. It was just as well we had built up a six-minute lead over the Ford after section one on Saturday."
Cox, a multiple off-road and enduro motorcycle champion who is in only his second season of off road car racing, also reported a mechanically trouble-free run. "But unfortunately Ralph was car sick on Saturday and this slowed us considerably, resulting in our having to make up a 10-minute deficit on Cronje and Birkin on Sunday. I drove as hard as I could and it was just good enough for us to take our second successive class win."
Vos and Ter Stege's class T Hardbody suffered a persistent misfire throughout Saturday, resulting in their running out of petrol about 350 km into section one while lying third behind Woolridge and Skjoldhammer in the Ford. It was discovered that the fuel injector had jammed open, flooding the engine with petrol.
Twenty nine competitors remained at the end of Saturday's section one, including three Nissan privateers who failed to reach the finish in Gaborone on Sunday afternoon. Husband and wife team Neels and Zelda van der Walt had done very well to complete the first 500 km of racing in 12th place overall and third in class E in their diesel Hardbody, only to suffer a broken upper wishbone 50 km into Sunday's route, which was the reverse of Saturday's.
JP and wife Linda Augustin in their GBS Racing Hardbody finished section one on Saturday in 13th place and fifth in class D. They went out on Sunday while lying third in class after hitting a small tree that holed their radiator, resulting in engine failure 100 km from the finish.
Arnold du Plessis and George Baker also survived the first 500 km of racing, finishing 16th overall and sixth in class D in their BB Auto Hardbody suffering steering problems. Then on Sunday they lost four-wheel drive within 10 km of the re-start in Gaborone and were eventually forced to retire 50 km before the halfway service point when their brakes failed.
Hein Grobler and Gerhard Prinsloo, who were leading the class D championship at the start of the Desert Race in their GBS Racing Hardbody, suffered electrical problems on Saturday which caused the onboard computer to fail when they were lying second in class and sixth overall.
GBS team-mates Johan Gerber and Coetzee Labuschagne hit a tree and damaged the diff on their class D Hardbody on Saturday. They repaired the damage at the service point only to retire just 60 km from the end of the first day's section when they realised they would not reach the finish in the time allowed.
|
 |
|
