Defending champions Mark Cronje and Robin Houghton have launched a late offensive on the championship-leading Toyotas, coming off this weekend’s PMC Gauteng Rally, the third round of the South African National Rally Championship, with maximum points.
The duo, in their #24 Ford Dealer Team Fiesta, led the rally after day one, winning two of the first three stages. The initial gap of 24,2 seconds was increased to 49,1 seconds by the end of day two when the Ford teammates secured two more stage wins and the victory – summing up a flawless performance by the Blue Oval-badged squad.
“Friday was good, Saturday was even better. We just kept the hammer down and focused on the job at hand. We certainly didn’t try and get too smart and the best way to lose concentration and mess up is to try and slow the pace too much,” Cronje said.
It was a good weekend for the Volkswagen Sasol Racing team, with the Polos of Henk Lategan and Barry White and Hans Weijs Jr and Bjorn Degandt finishing second and third respectively. Lategan and White carried a 30-second penalty from day one, but still finished just 49 seconds behind the winning Ford.
“We pushed really hard this rally. Especially on day two we sprang out the blocks, I have never driven so hard in my life. It felt really good and with a good test before the Volkswagen Rally, I think we can improve even more,” Lategan said.
The Castrol Toyota team had a somewhat disappointing weekend. First, the hard-charging Leeroy Poulter and Elvéne Coetzee, who were lying in second overall after stage one, had to retire after their Yaris’s engine let got on stage two. The pair rejoined the event under Super Rally rules on day two, but could only score half points despite impressive performances, and finished seventh overall. Teammates Hergen Fekken and Carolyn Swan also started the event well, but a more cautious approach to the rest of the rally saw them drop out of a possible second step on the podium to finish fourth.
The next event on the South African Rally Championship calendar is the Volkswagen Rally – which happens in the Eastern Cape (Port Elizabeth, Uitenhage and Jeffrey’s Bay) on 11 and 12 July. Will the VWs dominate their home event? Or will the Ford Fiesta of Cronje and Houghton take a second consecutive victory? Not if the front-running Toyotas have anything to do with it.
