Hi all,
the 2009 season is about to kick offwith the Total Tour Natal on the 13th and 14th of March.
Our team essentially remains the same as before , only a different prep company looking after the the still brand new Total Evolution Toyota Auris.
The car has undergone some upgrades in the off season , with hopefully all the teething problems sorted out, and allow us to have a full onslaught on the 2009 National title.
I will be off to Tzaneen next weekend for my regular prep sessions with Mohammed.
For the few of you that actually read this, i will keep you up to date with our progress throughout the season.
Keep an eye out for the new Team total livery on the car, i have not seen it, but as they say a change is as good as a holiday,
chat soon :-)
Friday, February 27, 2009
Friday, October 3, 2008
The Auris finally makes its Debut
Once again im letting the side down by not getting to this, but lots of things have happened of late, i moved to East London, so all been a bit of a rushWe debuted the new car in Barkley East in August, was a baptism of fire with the new steed, but we brought her home in 2nd in class, albeit 6min off the pace due to all kinds of problems
We were quite satisfied to get to the end and ecstatic with the potential of the car.
It was off to Cape Town 2 weeks ago for the Swartland Rally where we swept all 2 wheel drive cars aside to claim the first class win for an Auris in Africa, we did this by beating the bigger engined A7 cars and finishing a fine 10th overall.
The final rally in the Sasol South African Rally championship is the Toyota Dealer Rally on the 17th and 18th of October in Gauteng, this will be our home event, and we intend bringing the silverware home once again now that the car has shown its potential.
Monday, July 28, 2008
The 2008 Season
Hi all, apologies for not updating this site for a year now, work work work! For the rest of the year i will attempt to keep this thing up to date and keep you all informed of the progress of my new team.
At the beginning of 2008 i joined Mohammed Moosa in his Team Total evolution setup to take part in the 2008 Sasol South African National Rally championships, were 5 rallies into the 8 round series, we have had alot of ups and downs so far this season.
We began the year in a Toyota Corolla , an interim car while our brand new state of the art Toyota Auris is being built, this has taken alot longer than anticipated and the older car has had some reliability issues, this we have had a number of DNF's
So far our results for 2008:
Hitachi Tour Natal : 2nd
Toyota Cape Rally : DNF - Broken gearbox
Sasol Rally : 1st
Total Rally : DNF - Broken gearbox
VW Rally: DNF - Blown motor
The next round is the Osram rally, or better know as the Border Mountain trial, the Auris will debut here and we expect a tough rally with a new car. I will keep you up to date after the event.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Mind blowing VW Rally
This past weekend i had the opportunity to get into one of the most awesome rally machines in the country, a class A7 VW Golf 4, the opportunity came up when Barry Grobbelaars regular navigator Mike Burrows could not make the event.
It was all a bit of a rush as i was contacted on the monday before the event , getting the pace notes etc, but all came together when i arrived in PE on thursday afternoon, the car was immaculate, prepared by Fields Auto in P.E , these guys do a great job, the car looked brand new, and i was excited
The event started on friday morning with 4 tar stages, unfortunately at the beginning of stage 2 the car wouldnt start, the starter had given up and we ended up pushing the car into the stage and for a further probably 300m to get to a downhill and enough momentum to get the car going, all the spectators wanted to help, but as it is against the rules we had to do it all ourselves, the cheering kept us going , eventually we lost 14min in the stage, but got going.
The rest of day 1 was absolutely awesome, a 170Kw, front wheel drive rally car with a sequential gearbox has to be one of the most exciting cars to drive, and i enjoyed every minute of it in the nav seat!
Day 2 started well, after downloading the data after the first 2 stages, top speed 186mk/h in 6th gear at 8000rpm, it may not sound like that fast , but on dirt over blinde rises it is something to behold!!
after stage 12, all came to a disappointing end when the clutch seized completely arrving at service, the motor wouldnt turn over at all and our rally was run.
I have to thank Barry Grobbelaar and his Sasol golf for a great rally, and an awesome first experience in a seriously fast car.
Monday, June 25, 2007
The Total, a total disaster
Well i hoped it would come in 3's and that would be it, but i guess i put the mockers on it by saying it out loud.
The total international rally took place in Ermelo this last weekend, the event starting on thursday night with 2 super special stages. Dust played a major role in proceedings, and the 2nd stage was cancelled.
We went into day 2 3rd in class, we were immediately on the back foot when we realised we had a leaking front shock, seems like it broken on a bridge on the super special on which i was told we did some major low flying. With no time to change the shock we had to take on the first 2 stages of friday with the faulty part , we took it easy and surprisingly were right on the pace in any case. At the next service the shock was changed in 11 min, giving us 9 min to sip a cold drink!
the next set of 2 stages were a bit rougher , we slowly but surely got faster, catching the leaders in class . The third round of 2 stages were a repeat of the first 2 of the day, Allen gave it some welly on these stages and we took the lead in class A6 by 15 sec with one stage left in the day.
Stage 9 was a nightmare for most of us, with the setting sun and zero breeze the dust was ridiculous, you couldnt see more than a meter in front of the car, we over shot twice, the 2nd time the car struggled to start again! Salie du toit running on his old class N4 seeding had an advantage of having faster cars ahead of him was at less of a disadvantage and took 29sec out of us in the stage, leaving us 14 sec behind at the end of day 1.
it all came to an end 3.5km into the first stage of day 3, we hit a yump, and landed on an exposed rock, it snapped the rear shock off completely, Allen did well to keep the car from going over as the car flicked from one side to another! luckily no more harm was done, however our rally was over, very disappointing after such a promising day 2.
We will not be making the trip to PE for the next event, Allen has elected to do some extra work on the car, and we will be back for the Osram rally in Aliwal North, more from the national car then.
The total international rally took place in Ermelo this last weekend, the event starting on thursday night with 2 super special stages. Dust played a major role in proceedings, and the 2nd stage was cancelled.
We went into day 2 3rd in class, we were immediately on the back foot when we realised we had a leaking front shock, seems like it broken on a bridge on the super special on which i was told we did some major low flying. With no time to change the shock we had to take on the first 2 stages of friday with the faulty part , we took it easy and surprisingly were right on the pace in any case. At the next service the shock was changed in 11 min, giving us 9 min to sip a cold drink!
the next set of 2 stages were a bit rougher , we slowly but surely got faster, catching the leaders in class . The third round of 2 stages were a repeat of the first 2 of the day, Allen gave it some welly on these stages and we took the lead in class A6 by 15 sec with one stage left in the day.
Stage 9 was a nightmare for most of us, with the setting sun and zero breeze the dust was ridiculous, you couldnt see more than a meter in front of the car, we over shot twice, the 2nd time the car struggled to start again! Salie du toit running on his old class N4 seeding had an advantage of having faster cars ahead of him was at less of a disadvantage and took 29sec out of us in the stage, leaving us 14 sec behind at the end of day 1.
it all came to an end 3.5km into the first stage of day 3, we hit a yump, and landed on an exposed rock, it snapped the rear shock off completely, Allen did well to keep the car from going over as the car flicked from one side to another! luckily no more harm was done, however our rally was over, very disappointing after such a promising day 2.
We will not be making the trip to PE for the next event, Allen has elected to do some extra work on the car, and we will be back for the Osram rally in Aliwal North, more from the national car then.
Fun and games for Team ELB Catering supplies
The 3rd round of the Total Northern Regions championships The Imperial Toyota PMC Rally took place the 9th of June in the Bapsfontein area.
The ELB Catering Supplies Toyota made it to the finish once again, but not without fun and games with the normal dry winter conditions in Gauteng, no one could have predicted the muddy quagmires that were experienced by the 65 entrants.
Our rally started off at a leisurely place through stage 1, with a taste of the mud and water holes to look forward to, we wrong slotted once and also slid as most of the field did in one of the hairpin bends only a few hundred meters from the finish. We then started regretting the lack of rain tyres in the service van.
Stage 2 got a bit worse, mud water, and very slippery grass, a particular grass patch where we felt like we were standing still for a good few hundred meters.
Stage 3 was the icing on the cake, with a particular water hole that claimed probably half of the field for a good few minutes before they could get out. We were warned by spectators, however even a slow deliberate course caused us to get stuck, luckily Ernie stayed calmed and slowly reversed and by a miracle we managed to get to the other side of the lake.
Stage 4 was the best conditions of the rally, drier and faster than the other stages.
Stage 5 was the sting in the tail for many particularly the organizers, as the stage was a repeat of stage 1 with a change in direction close to the end to add some distance and a variation, the result being a number of competitors taking the wrong route and thus short cutting. This caused massive headaches for the scorers and COC to sort out. Our stage was quite eventful almost rolling, in Ernie’s words if he had lost a few Kg’s we would have gone over. The conditions were slightly better than the first time around, and I’m proud to say we stayed on the right road, no shortcuts for us.
An eventual 18th overall and 6th in class was not the best result ever, but without wet weather tyres it was just fine, continuing our perfect record of finishes since the beginning of last year.
The next event in the Total Northern Regions championships is the Carletonville Rally on the 7th of July.
The ELB Catering Supplies Toyota made it to the finish once again, but not without fun and games with the normal dry winter conditions in Gauteng, no one could have predicted the muddy quagmires that were experienced by the 65 entrants.
Our rally started off at a leisurely place through stage 1, with a taste of the mud and water holes to look forward to, we wrong slotted once and also slid as most of the field did in one of the hairpin bends only a few hundred meters from the finish. We then started regretting the lack of rain tyres in the service van.
Stage 2 got a bit worse, mud water, and very slippery grass, a particular grass patch where we felt like we were standing still for a good few hundred meters.
Stage 3 was the icing on the cake, with a particular water hole that claimed probably half of the field for a good few minutes before they could get out. We were warned by spectators, however even a slow deliberate course caused us to get stuck, luckily Ernie stayed calmed and slowly reversed and by a miracle we managed to get to the other side of the lake.
Stage 4 was the best conditions of the rally, drier and faster than the other stages.
Stage 5 was the sting in the tail for many particularly the organizers, as the stage was a repeat of stage 1 with a change in direction close to the end to add some distance and a variation, the result being a number of competitors taking the wrong route and thus short cutting. This caused massive headaches for the scorers and COC to sort out. Our stage was quite eventful almost rolling, in Ernie’s words if he had lost a few Kg’s we would have gone over. The conditions were slightly better than the first time around, and I’m proud to say we stayed on the right road, no shortcuts for us.
An eventual 18th overall and 6th in class was not the best result ever, but without wet weather tyres it was just fine, continuing our perfect record of finishes since the beginning of last year.
The next event in the Total Northern Regions championships is the Carletonville Rally on the 7th of July.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Hopefull it only comes in 3's
Well there isnt much to report on the Zulu Rally 2007.
We started off well, running 2nd in class for the first 2 stages, only for it all to come to an end in stage 3 when we came over a blinde rise to fast , the tyres were totally finished after the previous stage. We slid off going into a hairpin left , hit an earth bank and broke a lower control arm! that was our rally over!
We sat in the stage for around 5 hours before the service crew could get to us, we fixed the car and drove it out. We could have re-entered for day 2 under super rally rules, but would not earn any points! So we decided against risking damaging the car for no reason.
Next national rally is the Total International Rally in Ermelo next month.
We started off well, running 2nd in class for the first 2 stages, only for it all to come to an end in stage 3 when we came over a blinde rise to fast , the tyres were totally finished after the previous stage. We slid off going into a hairpin left , hit an earth bank and broke a lower control arm! that was our rally over!
We sat in the stage for around 5 hours before the service crew could get to us, we fixed the car and drove it out. We could have re-entered for day 2 under super rally rules, but would not earn any points! So we decided against risking damaging the car for no reason.
Next national rally is the Total International Rally in Ermelo next month.
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