With three of the six stages to be completed on the Volkswagen Rally in Port Elizabeth today, the start of the event seemed to be another replay of what we have seen on all previous events so far this year. Leeroy Poulter and Elvene Coetzee in a Team Castrol Toyota Yaris, got away in first place on stage one, with a time of 11:51.1 closely followed by the Ford Performance Ford Fiesta of Mark Cronje and Robin Houghton 2.8 seconds slower.
Third was Giniel de Villiers and Carolyn Swan in the other Toyota, followed by Japie van Niekerk and Gerhard Snyman in the NAD Ford Fiesta.
By the end of stage three the positions have not changed, but Poulter has managed to extend his lead over the Cronje Ford to 19.9 seconds, with Giniel still third 21.6 seconds behind the leader and Japie in fourth some 40.2 seconds behind Poulter. According to Cronje they had a puncture on stage three that cost him some time in his not so unusual fight with the Toyota of Poulter.
And then on stage 2 the bad luck that has been dogging Henk Lategan and Barry White in a Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo struck again in the form of a puncture that cost him some five minutes and dropped him right back to 17th overall. He made up four places to be 13th at the service break 5:25.7 behind the leader.
Ashley-Haigh Smith’s rally in the Ford Fiesta R2 hardly lasted one stage when he had to withdraw due to suspension problems.
Hergen Fekken in the other Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo was fifth overall 1:33.8 off the lead, followed by Ernie van der Walt, in a Toyota Yaris 1:38.0 behind Poulter.
Guy Botterill in a Toyota Etios R2 was 6th +3:52.4 and leading the S1600 class followed by another S1600 competitor Paulus Franken also in a Toyota Etios R2 +3:59.8.
Gugu Zulu found himself in the unusual 8th overall position in his Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo 4:00.6 behind. It is not known if he had a problem.
The Volkswagen Rally is round five of the SA National Rally Championship and is being copntested over 12 stages with a total stage lenght of 199km. It ends in Port Elizabeth tomorrow.