Lookout 03

We decided not to sleep in the van on Saturday night, which turned out right as there was a severe ground frost. Setting off at 6.30am meant we would get there before the gates closed. The mist lifted for stage 1 and seeded at 21 meant we were going early on for a change. The organisers had made an attempt to fill in any large holes around the track which seemed to have worked on the whole. Coming down the bumpy dusty straight to the grandstand I went for first into the chicane and hit a bump, trying to accelerate out of it I realised something was wrong as the engine was dead! I coasted off the track. Calmly, for me, I looked around the switches, main switch on, spots on, eh? spots on, why? Oh ignition switch off! I must have caught it whilst going for 1st gear and knocked it off whilst knocking the spots on. The engine fired up reluctantly and we were off again. Must have dropped 30 seconds but we got round that one.

The organisers switched to 1 minute intervals on the next stage due to dust impairing visibility. We were running about the 18th position in the field now and back to 30 second intervals. Stage 4 saw my gear linkage come from together at the cross member. Luckily? I was in 4th and so finished both laps in this gear! At service I found that the linkage had jumped off the ball and the 'R' clip was still in place in the socket. Not only this but it is very difficult to refit the socket with the other half of the linkage above it! Odd? but at Melbourne airfield odd things happen to vehicles. Any way with that fixed we were still in and only dropped some more time and slightly embarrassed with probably looking like a novice through the corners trying to slip the clutch out of 1st gear chicanes. We were back up to 21st position because of that. Stage 6 and the pug was handling like a floundering Whale in the shallows. It felt like the back end and an inspection showed the rear shox well and truly had it allowing the rear tyres to compress into the arches and the calipers to touch the chassis rails!

There was not much to do but go for a finish and we were back up to 17th. Stage 7 and we hit a large hole with a very big clang from the rear whilst chasing a subaru down a flat straight. At the end there was a substantial bank and a 90 right. I left the brakes to the death but found the pedal to the floor! Woops! frantic pumping and lots of steering wheel wielding saw me make the bend and I realised the front brakes were still intact. I wound all the bias to the front and continued. At service I thought we had knocked the brake pipe off and fluid was adorning the rear rim. But on inspection I found the rear of the caliper missing completely! Well they say things come in 3's.

1 stage to go no rear brakes and fluid on the tyre! It was going to be steady. There were no dramas on this stage and speed was kept up through the stage which suprised me and we actually knocked 10 seconds off our previous time! It involved getting all the braking out of the way for the corners as I had lost my handbrake as well and driving it through as smooth as possible! Is this the answer to less horsepower, no brakes and an evily handling car?

So we finished 16th O/A, 5th in class and best mixed crew on an event that still remains rough and wrecks my car, but, you know, I had so much fun that it just has to be done again. The event runs smoothly even though the track gets rougher and there are many failures, not just with my car. The sun shone and the rallying is good here. All I can say is if you haven't tried Melbourne you could pick a worse single venue than this so get it in your 2004 calendar.