In a dramatic Toyota Cape Dealer Rally, Mark Cronje and navigator Gerhard Snyman, managed to keep their Ford Performance Fiesta S2000 on the road and win the event. This also allowed Cronje to move into the lead of this year’s South African National Rally Championship.
Former championship leaders Leeroy Poulter/Elvéne Coetzee (Castrol Team Toyota Yaris) had a rally to forget. First the pair hit a wall at Killarney on Friday day which put them under pressure. Poulter had to push hard on Saturday to make up lost time and it appeared to pay off as they managed to climb to fifth position overall after stage eight. Then disaster struck when Poulter lost control over a series of high-speed jumps and the car rolled, ending their challenge.
Other challengers that joined the attrition list included Henk Lategan/Barry White (Sasolracing Volkswagen Polo) with a suspension failure on the last stage, Giniel de Villiers and Carolyn Swan spectacularly rolled their Castrol Toyota Yaris out of the rally on stage 10 and Enzo Kuun and Kes Naidoo (NAD Ford Fiesta) had engine trouble that forced them to stop – also on the final stage.
Final results:
Driver/Co-driver | Team | Car | Class | |
1 | Mark Cronje / Gerhard Snyman | Ford Performance Team | Ford Fiesta | S2000 |
2 | Gugulethu Zulu / Hilton Auffrey | Volkswagen Sasolracing | Volkswagen Polo | S2000 |
3 | Hergen Fekken / Pierre Arries | Volkswagen Sasolracing | Volkswagen Polo | S2000 |
Driver/Co-driver | Team | Car | Class | |
1 | Guy Botterill / Simon Vacy-Lyle | Simon Vacy-Lyle | Toyota Etios R2 | S1600 |
2 | Matthew Vacy-Lyle / Schalk Van Heerden | Simon Vacy-Lyle | Toyota Etios R2 | S1600 |
3 | Ashley Haigh-Smith / Nial Burns | Ashley Haigh-Smith | Ford Fiesta R2 | S1600 |
Driver/Co-driver | Team | Car | Class | |
1 | Etienne Malherbe / Mauritz Malherbe | Mauritz Malherbe | Datsun SSS | NRC2 |
2 | Paul van Wyk / Quinton Swarts | Quinton Swarts | Volkswagen Golf | NRC2 |
3 | Ebrahim Levy / Matthew Jason Kohler | Matthew Jason Kohler | Toyota Corolla | NRC2 |