Toyota takes dramatic Cullinan Rally

Poulter and Coetzee took their third consecutive victory in the series

Poulter and Coetzee took their third consecutive victory in the series

Published Aug 17, 2015

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Cullinan, Tshwane - Leeroy Poulter and Elvene Coetzee (Toyota Yaris S2000) hung on against the odds to snatch a dramatic victory in a hard-fought Cullinan Rally at the weekend.

The outcome of the sixth round of the SA Rally championship was hanging in the balance until the second-last stage when championship leaders Mark Cronje and Robin Houghton went out with steering problems on their factory Ford Fiesta S2000.

Up to that point, with two stages to go, the championship leaders led their Toyota Yaris challengers by a margin of only 1.3 seconds, and all was set for a nail-biting finale to the dusty rally in and around the town of Cullinan in Tshwane.

But it was not to be…

After winning all four stages on Friday Cronje and Houghton had a handy lead of 12.7 seconds over Poulter and Coetzee, but in the opening stage on Saturday morning (won by Henk Lategan and Barry White in their VW Polo racing under Superally rules) were eight seconds slower than the Toyota crew.

Cronje and Houghton duly made up the lost time in the next stage, winning it, but then lost 10 seconds to Poulter and Coetzee in stage eight, cutting their lead down to only 2.3 seconds. In the next stage Poulter took another 0.4 seconds out of their lead, to trail by only 1.9 seconds.

DOUBLE PODIUM

The Ford crew's woes in the next stage (they managed to fix the steering, losing 16 minutes, and were eventually classified 15th overall) saw Poulter and Coetzee take their third consecutive victory in the series - thereby level-pegging their championship chances.

It was also a double podium for the works Toyota team with Giniel de Villiers and Carolyn Swan finishing runners-up - just under half a minute adrift of their team-mates.

However, getting lost in the excitement of the battle for victory was the mighty tussle between De Villiers and Swan, and the experienced VW crew of Hergen Fekken and Pierre Arries. The two teams were swopping virtually identical times in the stages, and at the finish the difference between them was only 7.3 seconds.

While team mates Lategan and White were making hay under Superally rules, winning three special stages on Saturday, Gugu Zulu and Hilton Auffray (VW Polo S2000) drove a steady race to secure fourth, followed by team mates Thilo Himmel and Armand du Toit, scoring a rare race finish in fifth, with Ernie van der Walt and Greg Godrich (Toyota Yaris S2000) sixth.

Theuns Joubert and Mari van der Walt (Toyota Auris) put in a measured drive to finish seventh overall and win the NRC4 challenge after Namibians Wilro Dippenaar and Kes Naidoo (Toyota Auris) had to withdraw just before the final stage. This effort also saw Joubert and Van der Walt finish second in the regional event.

S1600

The battle royal in the S1600 class was highlighted by the spectacular crash of log leaders Matthew Vacy-Lyle and Schalk van Heerden. The pair hit a big jump in stage eight and their Toyota Etios R2 landed badly, causing it to roll over at high speed. Luckily neither was hurt.

Meanwhile their fellow Toyota campaigners and overnight class leaders Guy Botterill and Simon Vacy-Lyle stretched their advantage over Chad van Beurden and Nico Swartz (Ford Fiesta R2) after the Ford pair lost more than three minutes in stage six.

With Richard Leeke and Rikus Fourie (Ford Fiesta R2) rolling out of contention after breaking a control arm, and AC Potgieter and Tommy du Toit (VW Polo R2) damaging their radiator when hitting a major jump in stage nine, Paulus Franken and Henry Kohne (VW Polo R2) moved up to second in the class, finishing nearly 1m40 behind the Etios team, with Van Beurden and Swartz third.

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