MOTORSPORT: Underdog's Australian Rally Championship

Persistent privateer Nathan Quinn, driving a 10-year-old Mitsubishi Lancer, is the new Australian rally champion after heartbreak for Subaru’s Molly Taylor in her quest for
back-to-back titles.

Quinn, 31, clinched the five-round ARC in front of his family and friends on home soil outside Coffs Harbour, NSW, at Rally Australia. He dominated the national field in the event, winning all three legs, taking 12 of 17 stage wins and claiming victory by a massive 13 minutes.

He also finished eighth outright as Hyundai’s Belgian driver Thierry Neuville won the World Rally Championship finale to finish championship runner-up to Frenchman Sebastien Ogier.

Taylor, 29, the first woman to become the Australian rally champion driver, went into the Coffs Harbour decider 30 points ahead of Quinn but wound up 49 points behind him, 282 to 331.

She had turbocharger trouble late in Saturday’s competition and, despite her crew having worked through the night on her Production Rally Car class Subaru WRX STI, failed to make it past Sunday’s first control point.

“We tried to run, we knew it was going to be a small chance … we tried everything,” a hugely disappointed Taylor said. “What happened was something that we couldn’t control.”

For Quinn, who has concentrated on the WRC section of Rally Australia in previous years, the national title is a fairytale.

He said it was only an off-hand remark from multiple champion Eli Evans which made him register for this year’s ARC.

“We went to the Eureka Rally [the first round at Ballarat in Victoria in mid-March] to get a seed to do a classic rally we wanted to do,” Quinn said.

“Eli Evans said: ‘Quinny, you never know, you should just register for the championship’. So I borrowed $1500 bucks off my girlfriend, and paid it back by June. Then [long-time Toyota team] Neal Bates Motorsport helped me get to Western Australia [for round two]. Then a bunch of Irish lads chipped in for a new engine.

“We could not have asked for a better year in terms of support and here we are now.

“It was an unfortunate problem for Molly but a miracle for us.

“I’m pretty sure I was born with a dream to go rallying.

“Watching my dad compete when I was a kid, this day was the goal from the get-go and now I’ve finished that for him.”

Quinn’s championship hopes looked to be over after the third round in May when he failed to finish Canberra’s National Capital Rally after electrical gremlins stopping him by the roadside agonisingly close to the finish.

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However, he dominated Rally South Australia, claiming his first ARC round win and renewing his title hopes which he has now turned into reality.

New South Welshman Tom Clarke and co-driver Ryan Preston finished the final ARC round second in another Evo IX after great difficulty in Sunday morning’s wet and slippery conditions.

“We really had to back off, we weren’t getting any traction,” Clarke said. “We had a couple of spins a couple of offs.”

West Australian John O’Dowd’s third place in a Subaru was his first podium and gave him third in the championship with 216 points.

Taylor’s co-driver Bill Hayes took the national title for co-drivers for the second year.

The ARC will return to six rounds next year, with a Tasmanian event back on the calendar for the first time since 2010 at a location not yet named as the promoter agreement has not been finalised.

Canberra’s National Capital Rally will remain the Asia-Pacific Rally Championship round, contrary to speculation some weeks ago that it would be a second event at Coffs Harbour.

South Australia is on the calendar again with a revamped event in the Adelaide Hills under different management to that which has run Rally SA for about 15 years.

2018 Australian Rally Championship calendar
Round 1 – Eureka Rally, Ballarat, Victoria, March 3-4.
Round 2 – Forest Rally, Busselton, Western Australia, April 27-29.
Round 3 – National Capital Rally (APRC), Canberra, ACT, June 1-3.
Round 4 – Rally Tasmania, location TBA, July 27-29.
Round 5 – Adelaide Hills Rally, South Australia, September 21-23.
Round 6 – Rally Australia, Coffs Coast, NSW, November 15-18.

Hyundai must be favourites for 2018 WRC
Rally Australia was a great weekend for Hyundai with its i20s and, to a lesser extent, for new world champion team M-Sport with its Ford Fiestas…but it was a shocker for both Toyota and Citroen.

Neuville won 14 of the 19 stages of the final round of the 2017 WRC and Hayden Paddon,
Hyundai’s New Zealander, ended with his second best result of the season, third place (he was second in Poland at the start of July), after Finn Jari-Matti Latvala crashed his Toyota Yaris on the final Power Stage.

And Andreas Mikkelsen, last year’s victor at Coffs Harbour, again showed plenty of speed, including leading in his third event with Hyundai until hitting a bank and finding himself short a spare tyre.

Neuville’s victory was his fourth this year, two more than any other driver, and with Mikkelsen now full-time, Hyundai must start favourite next season, even though the M-Sport Ford team posted five wins this year.

It is still not clear whether Ogier will remain with M-Sport next year – conditional on fuller backing from Ford – or return to his roots at struggling Citroen.

Hyundai won the most stages on the 13 events this year – 91, compared to 47 last year.
Neuville, runner-up the past two seasons, said his first Rally Australia victory was “very special”.

“It was a tricky final morning and we didn’t want to take too many risks, so to take our fourth win of the year is fantastic.

“It’s really the ideal way to end the season and it gives us a massive motivation for next season.”

Third at Coffs Harbour, including a stage win, was some consolation for Kiwi Paddon, who will share the third Hyundai with Spaniard Dani Sordo next year.

“We never want to score a podium through someone else’s misfortune, and it’s a shame for Jari-Matti, but it’s a nice result for us after a tough year,” Paddon said.

“There is some light at the end of the tunnel in terms of finding our feeling with the car. We have found some answers this weekend, which has been the main objective.

“We were quite lucky with the weather on Sunday morning, as we seemed to avoid the worst of the rain in Bucca [stage] and could take a stage win.

“The car felt better after we made another big change with the diff mapping.

“We’ve just been gathering information for the future and were set on bringing the car home safely.”

Hyundai team Principal Michel Nandan said having two cars on the podium at the final event of the season was “exactly what we wanted to achieve.”

“Our first-ever victory in Australia and a double podium is the perfect way to end the season,” Nandan said.

“The conditions were far from easy on the final day, but all crews kept calm and got the best out of themselves.

“We have taken our highest number of stage wins in a single event, which shows the high level of performance of our i20 Coupe WRC on this tricky gravel surface.

“All in all, we have plenty of positives to take away from this year. It has been one of the most closely contested seasons in WRC.”

M-Sport principal Malcolm Wilson was delighted at Tanak maintaining his team’s record of representation on every WRC podium this year.

“This has been an absolutely incredible season for the team and we have truly sealed it in style this weekend,” Wilson said.

“We knew this was likely to be our most challenging event of the year, so to have all three cars in the top five (Ogier fourth and Evans fifth) at the end of the rally is fantastic.

“It really does mirror our performance throughout the season with all three of our crews also securing top-five positons in the championship.

“We have produced a car that can reliably perform on any surface.”

Ogier’s Fiesta had a gearbox glitch throughout the weekend but he shone at the end with the fastest time on the Power Stage.

“It’s not been the smoothest of rallies for us, but at least we finished on a small positive,” Ogier said.

“It was more or less the only stage of the rally where everything was working.

“We had a lot to contend with this weekend – technical issues and our starting position through the opening stages.

“We just tried to stay focused and in the end that strategy paid off – fourth place was pretty unexpected.

“But it really has been a fantastic season. A big thanks to Malcolm and the whole team. What we have achieved together this year really is incredible.”

World Rally Championship final driver standings after 13 rounds – 1. Sebastien Ogier (France, M-Sport, Ford Fiesta) 232 points; 2. Thierry Neuville (Belgium, Hyundai i20) 208; 3. Ott Tanak (Estonia, M-Sport, Ford Fiesta) 191; 4. Jari-Matti Latvala (Finland, Toyota Yaris) 136; 5. Elfyn Evans (Great Britain, M-Sport, Ford Fiesta) 128; 6. Daniel Sordo (Spain, Hyundai i20) 95; 7. Kris Meeke (GB, Citroen C3) 77; 8. Hayden Paddon (New Zealand, Hyundai i20) 74; 9. Juho Hanninen (Finland, Toyota Yaris) 71; 10. Craig Breen (Ireland, Citroen C3) 64; 11. Esapekka Lappi (Finland, Toyota Yaris) 62; 12. Andreas Mikkelsen (Norway, Skoda/Citroen/Hyundai) 54.

WRC manufacturer final standings – 1. M-Sport Ford 428 points; 2. Hyundai 345; 3. Toyota 251; 4. Citroen 218.

Toyota trumps Porsche, but too late
Toyota has ended the World Endurance Championship on a high, with its TS050 Hybrid winning the Six Hours of Bahrain a lap ahead of both Porsche 919 Hybrids in their final race.

It was Toyota’s fifth win in the nine-round championship, but Porsche had already sealed the manufacturer and driver titles – and, of course, won the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the third straight year.

All of Toyota’s victories this year have been achieved by the same driver trio – Switzerland’s Sebastien Buemi, Japan’s Kazuki Nakajima and Britain’s Anthony Davidson.

The team’s second TS050 Hybrid finished three laps down in Bahrain.

Similarly, all of Porsche’s wins in its final season of hybrid prototype sports car racing have been by its 2017 world champion trio, New Zealanders Brendon Hartley and Earl Bamber and German Timo Bernhard.

Both Porsche 919 Hybrids had hiccups in Bahrain – Bernhard got a lane marker wedged in the nose which required a change of front end, while Brit Nick Tandy had to make an unscheduled stop because of a puncture after colliding with a Porsche 911 RSR.

Dual Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso tested a Toyota TS050 the day after the race, driving 113 laps of the Bahrain circuit in it – despite having one grand prix to go with the Honda power unit he so despises in his McLaren.

Meanwhile, Brendon Hartley has been confirmed for a full F1 season next year with Toro Rosso, which will take over the Honda power as McLaren switches to Renault engines.
Hartley will remain contracted to Porsche for some racing and promotional appearances.