Instead of it disappearing in the thick sand on the Bela Bela Rally stages, Leeroy Poulter/Elvene Coetzee in a Team Castrol Toyota Yaris have managed to keep their SA National Rally Championship hopes alive by winning the rally. Poulter took the lead from the start yesterday winning seven stages on the trot. He managed to keep his main rival and current leader of the championship, Mark Cronje/Robin Houghton in a Ford Performance Ford Fiesta at bay.
On this rally the roles were reversed. This time it was Poulter in the Toyota that dominated from the start with Cronje having to play second fiddle for the first time this season. Poulter finished the rally with a total penalty of 2:05:06.9 beating Cronje by 28.8 seconds. He started the second day this morning with a lead of 19.1 seconds.
Third overall was the NAD Ford Fiesta of Japie van Niekerk/Gerhard Snyman 2:00.6 behind the leader. Van Niekerk inherited third place after Hergen Fekken in a Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo withdrew with a broken wheel on stage 8.
Gugu Zulu/Hilton Auffray in a Sasolracing Polo slotted into fourth place 2:04.2 behind.
Giniel de Villiers/Carolyn Swan started the rally on a positive note yesterday and were second until a puncture on the fourth stage cost them some four minutes and dropped him to 8th overall overnight. They finished in fifth overall 2:13.4 off the leader.
Henk Lategan/Barry White struggled in the thick sand in their Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo and in addition a puncture on stage 7 dropped him from 5th to 10th place. They adjusted the suspension of the car after stage seven and won the next two stages preventing Poulter from having a clean sweep of stage wins.
Lategan made up four places in three stages to finish 6th overall.
Seventh was Ernie van der Walt/Greg Godrich in a Toyota Yaris 6:39.2 behind Poulter.
Class S1600 was won by Guy Botterill with a total time of 2:18:36.6. He was driving a Toyota Etios R2. Second was Chad van Beurden in a Ford Fiesta R2 +1:04.1 and third Matthew Vacy-Lyle also in a Toyota +1:06.1.
The ten stage rally, round four of the National Rally Championship, finished in Bela Bela this afternoon.
The scores are provisional and a final wrap of the event will be published once it becomes available.