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.