adminremaining, the time to play safe is over for the young Zimbabwean motor rally driver and his French co-driver Nicolas Klinger.
The championship is a straight fight between the privateer Green Fuel Ford Fiesta S2000 team and the similar Ford Fiesta of Mark Cronje/Robin Houghton, as well as the factory Volkswagen of Enzo Kuun/Guy Hodgson and the works Toyota of Johnny Gemmell/Drew Sturrock, with 11 points between first and fourth in the title race and 50 still available.
Hanging over the Zimbabwean/French combination is a Court of Appeal hearing over their exclusion from the Gauteng Rally, which is due to be heard just before the final round. The South African Rally Commission has allowed ethanol to be used in the South African series with immediate effect so Rautenbach will be running on Green Fuel in South Africa for the first time.
“I’m excited by the development and anyone can use the product. It has a higher octane rating and therefore produces more power while the car runs quite a bit cooler. It’s quite a bit cheaper as well,” Rautenbach explained.
“It really doesn’t matter what the outcome of the court is, we have to win both of the remaining rallies to stand a chance of winning the Championship,” said Rautenbach. “Our only option is to go for it; I can’t take the easy option. We’ll be going out there to win, but so will at least half a dozen of the other guys”.
“We did a test at Donnybrook recently and we’ve gone back to basics on the set-up. The Fiesta feels more stable and I’m more confident and relaxed in the car so I’m pretty happy we will be competitive,” Rautenbach assured his fans.
The penultimate round of the South African series is the Toyota Dealer Cape Rally, which takes place next weekend on the west coast grain farms north of Cape Town.
A quarter of the route features tarmac roads at the Killarney racetrack.
“At least this year I will have an idea which way the circuit goes,” laughed Rautenbach. “There are a couple of guys who are very quick on tarmac but they are not in the championship, so I will only push as hard as I need to against my direct rivals.
“The gravel roads are very fast and fairly smooth with a number of contours and not particularly rough.
“Mark has been strong over the last few rallies and he will be our biggest threat in the Cape, while Johnny is consistently quick. The VW guys have dropped off the pace a bit but Enzo has been very constant throughout the year, even though he doesn’t have the quickest car.
“It’s going to be a hard fight but we’re up for it. I’m not thinking about the championship but rather taking this event as just another rally to go out and try our best to win it.”
After the Garden Route Rally last month, Rautenbach and Klinger headed to Tanzania for the sixth round of the FIA African Rally Championship, which the pair has led all year. They top the points log by a margin of 11 and head directly from the Cape to Rwanda for round seven of the FIA series – the KCB Rwanda Mountain Gorilla Rally – which will be held from September 30 to October 2.
Meanwhile, Cronje and Houghton lead the South African Rally Championship log by four points as Team Sasol heads into the penultimate round in the Swartland region of the Western Cape.
With four teams vying for the title, there is no time to relax or dwell on Team Sasol’s hat-trick of victories as the technicians ready the pair of M-Sport Ford Fiesta S2000s for battle.
The Toyota Dealer Cape Rally is one of Mark’s favourite events having claimed his maiden victory on this event two years ago while Jon Williams and Cobus Vrey built their rally careers on the canola and wheat field farm roads that make up the bulk of the route. The new championship leaders will leave the start ramp first but their title rivals should remember that road-sweeping duties did not slow the lead Team Sasol Fiesta on the recent Garden Route Rally, where Mark and Robin thundered through the first stage on Saturday morning two seconds per kilometre faster than their main challengers.
“We’ve run first on the road on the Saturday on nearly every rally, so we’re not overly concerned”, Robins asserts.
With 32 percent of the fastest stage times this season and three wins from the last three events, the Team Sasol Ford pair has gained crucial championship momentum at a critical part of the season.
“It’s going to be an interesting event”, said Mark. “There are two big events ahead and the title fight will go all the way. Johnny (Gemmell) will have a far better road position and the Toyota has got
serious horsepower while Leeroy (Poulter) has nothing to lose by going all out for the win, even though he’s out of the championship.
“Conrad (Rautenbach) seems to have gone off the boil and I think Enzo is suffering the effects of Volkswagen running a car that started life six years ago, but none of them can be discounted.”
The region is renowned for a lot of contours that cause the cars to get serious airtime under their gravel tyres.
“I’m not scared of the jumps – the car is very good over them. The roads are wide and quite smooth, a bit like the Volkswagen Rally but without the mountains and there’s not much to hit if you overcook it a bit; it’s the type of terrain that I really enjoy,” Mark added.
“Whatever happens by the end of the year, I’m ecstatic with our season. The sport needs an exciting showdown and the Cape fans are in for a really spectacular show. We have a test planned and will be putting in maximum effort and we’ll see where it goes from there”, Mark concluded. Jon Williams has his best opportunity of the year to achieve his objective of standing on the podium as he chases a top five placing on the leaderboard.
“I know the type of roads well and while I don’t know every road, I have a good idea of their nature and the grip levels. I would like to end in the top five of the championship and to do that, I need a podium or two,” said Jon.
“The cautious approach I’ve taken so far hasn’t really worked, so I think I’m going to go 120 percent from the first stage and if I need to lean on a fence or two then that’s what I have to do,” Jon laughed. “I’m excited to be driving the Sasol Fiesta at home and want to put on a good show for my fans and put the bad luck I’ve had this year behind me. I’ve got a good feeling for this one and can’t
wait to get going.
“The tarmac element is quite big so I must apply my mind to achieving a good set up for that – not just arrive and hope for the best. You can lose – or gain – a significant amount of time on the black stuff on this event because it is about 25 percent of the route. I have a plan and Cobus and I will put in a lot effort to perfect our notes,” Jon continued.
“I’ve viewed the in-car video footage and spent a lot of time looking at the data to help me improve my driving and set-up and the Cape Rally is where I hope it will pay off. If I can keep one or two of the championship guys behind me to help Mark, that will be a bonus. I don’t have the same gearbox options as Mark in terms of longer gearbox ratios but the Fiesta’s brakes are very good and that will help me make up time. I hope the niggling problems are a thing of the past and we can look forward to a clean run,” said the young Cape Town-based driver.
“The Toyotas have serious horsepower and speed so I expect them to be the biggest threat. Volkswagen is strong as a unit and they have strength in depth but any of the championship leaders and a few others can be on-song on the day so we’ll have to wait and see,” was Jon’s assessment of his rivals.
The Toyota Dealer Cape rally is headquartered at Killarney race track, which is the venue for the podium celebrations. The event starts from the Toyota dealership in Tableview at 1pm on Friday September 23, while Saturday’s action gets underway at 8am.
The rally is due to end at 4pm.
Online Reporter