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Giandomenico
Basso took full advantage of the super-fast tarmac stages of
the 36th Rally Bulgaria last weekend to claim a stunning victory which
puts his FIA European Rally Championship title assault
firmly back on track.
The 36th Rally
Bulgaria was to be the fourth round of this year's
prestigious nine-event FIA European Rally Championship. Long
time Fiat Punto pilot Giandomenico Basso - along with
regular co-driver Mitia Dotta - would be contesting the
event as part of their factory-backed assault on the whole
series. This year in fact, Fiat have returned to rallying -
in the Super 1600 class - in some style and with high
ambition: Micro Baldacci leads a two-car team contesting the
FIA Junior World Rally Championship, Paolo Andreucci is once
again challenging for the CSAI Italian Rally Championship
(and at the same time developing Fiat's proposed 'Super
2000' rally car), while Basso and Dotta's programme
completes the line-up from the blue-liveried cars. All these
drivers are using the small, agile and very rapid,
front-wheel-drive Super 1600 Fiat Punto developed by
N-Technology, and all of the drivers have been at the sharp
end of their category action all year.
With just three points to his name this year, and a
retirement last time out on the Rallye d'Ypres, Basso needed
nothing less than a strong helping of points in Bulgaria as
the 2005 FIA European Rally Championship approached the
halfway stage, to keep his title aspirations alive. The 36th
edition of the Rally Bulgaria would give him ample
opportunity: the long, ultra-fast tarmac stages would suite
him and the little Punto perfectly, and with the weather
forecast to be dry, conditions would be ideal. His biggest
challenge would come from Simon Jean Joseph and Jack Boyere
in the Super 1600 class Renault Clio - the car run by the
highly experienced French ORECA outfit - and from Dimitar
Iliev and Yanaki Yanakiev - the highly experienced reigning
Bulgarian Rally Champion's - in their Boyla Motorsport-run
Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VII.
After the
spectator-friendly 2.85km opening 'super special' on Friday
evening, the rally got underway in earnest on Saturday
morning with the 28.89km 'Muhovo' special stage. Basso
immediately got his rally off to a flying start as he posted
the fastest time, 4.1 seconds ahead of his FIA ERC
arch-rival Jean Joseph in the Renault Clio, to snatch the
overall rally lead. Jean Joseph responded on the next
18.24km to take away his advantage, while on the stage after
(SS4, Sestrimo 1, 30.11km) Basso went fastest again- - 2.5
seconds ahead of the Clio driver - to regain the lead. Jean
Joseph hit a problem which lost him almost 50 seconds to the
Fiat pilot on SS5, and with a another fastest time in the
bag on the opening day's final stage (SS7, Yundola 2,
18.57km), Basso was able to go into overnight Parc Fermé
with the rally lead safe, and holding a useful advantage of
49.3 seconds over Jean Joseph. The combination of Basso and
the nimble, rapid Super 1600 Fiat Punto were proving to be
the outfit to match, and the pair were reveling in the very
fast, dry tarmac stages which were seeing average speeds of
up to 100km/h.
At the end of
the second leg - as he settled down as overnight leader -
Basso commented: "All of the three special stages which I
won today were very attractive. I enjoyed “Sestrimo” the
most. My car 'Fiat Punto' was standing very well on the
track. The competition tomorrow will be very important and I
know that it is very important for us to stay focused. We
have to keep the rhythm in which we drove today."
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