National Championship Success For Major Motorsport!
Major Motorsport secured double honours on the REIS Asphalt Championship’s final round at the Keith Knocks Cheviot rally held at the Otterburn ranges this week!
The event had a very strong entry; Simon and Brian were seeded in the top 5, in a top 10 full of World Rally Cars! Despite a limited program of events this year, Simon and Brian started the rally with an outside chance of winning the 2 wheel drive challenge and the overall co-drivers championship.
Conditions were extremely difficult with heavy rain and thick fog on the opening loop of stages, here perfect notes paid their part, and gave Simon and Brian the confidence to push on and finish the first loop of stages in 3rd overall. After stage 5 the crew moved up another place, despite the roads still being very wet.
The crew held a strong 2nd position throughout the day, and after event leader Damien Cole received a time penalty on SS7, were leading the rally overall! But that didn’t last long, when problems struck. The MK2’s clutch was being temperamental all day, but finally gave up completely with 4 stages to go. The alternator had also broken half way through the day, so Simon had to start the MK2 by leaving it in gear, using the starter button to bring the engine to life, and bunny hop off the start lines of the last four stages!! This was working OK, but the first stage after the last service was uphill! So to have any chance the crew put in an extra battery to help the starter, removed all weight from the car including spare wheel, jack and sump guard. The crew also borrowed some 13” wheels to put on the back to help gear the MK2 down, but only had slick tyres (used in hot dry weather conditions) to fit them, and it had started to pour with rain again!
To make things worse, with no alternator, Simon had to switch off all electrics including windscreen wipers (it was still raining), heated screen and power steering!
Meanwhile, John Indri only had to finish 2nd 2 wheel drive to Simon and Brian in order to win the Millington 2 Wheel Drive Championship, but due to a problem with his yellow Darrian, he couldn’t get his car out of the last service, so retired…
Simon and Brian limped through the last few stages to come to the last time control to finish the rally, only 20 seconds off the win, in joint 2nd overall, and in turn, be crowned National Champions!!
Brian won the OVERALL MSA Championship Co-drivers title (Damien who won the overall drivers title had a few different co-drivers over the season, so none racked up enough points. Brian beat Steve Simpson’s co-driver, Patrick Walsh who had been at the top of the table all season, to the title by a mere 1 point!), this is an incredible achievement, let along one accomplished in a 2 wheel drive car against all of the WRC machinery he had as competition.
Simon won the 2 Wheel Drive Championship and his class, B12. He came 4th overall driver (having competed in fewer rounds than the entire rest of the top 10!).
A great end to the MSA Championship for Major Motorsport, and we would like to take this opportunity, once again, to thank everyone who made this possible.
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