The Fiat Rally the seventh round of the FIA European Rally Championship - couldn't have gone by without the signature of Fiat's own drivers being stamped on it! Thus, from the very first stage of the rally, held on Friday 9th September, to the last evening stage, all the special timed tests were won by Fiat's drivers, namely Giandomenico Basso and Mirco Baldacci.

Fiat wanted nothing less than very strong results from its drivers: Fiat already has in Turkey, a large workforce which is involved in assembling several models of car for the European markets, while its Tofas subsidiary has sponsored this rally for the last few years. Tofas even pushed the Fiat rallying team to develop a special model for rallying purposes - the Fiat Palio Super1600 - which was developed by Paolo Andreucci during 2002 and 2003.

This year, after recent Fiat announcements which are intend to enforce Fiat's presence and power in rallying, the Turin-based carmaker opted for an even stronger presence in this rally. So all the factory drivers' being registered for the Fiat Rally, that is, Paolo Andreucci, the Tuscan driver who is currently contesting the CSAI Italian Rally Championship, Giandomenico Basso, running in the FIA-sanctioned European series, and the Sanmarinese youngster Mirco Baldacci, who is immersed in a campaign taking in the fiercely fought out FIA Junior World Rally Championship.

The Fiat Rally was however won by current FIA European Rally Champion, Simon Jean Joseph, who is at the wheel of an Oreca Team-run, and factory-supported Renault Clio Super1600. The Martinican driver claimed his first victory of the 2005 season, but this victory did seem to be a gift packed for him by the Fiat team.

After just the opening two stages, Giandomenico Basso, driving a Procar-run Fiat Punto Super1600 was already dominating the Turkish event, even though the driver from Cavaso del Tomba, was making his debut on the Izmir-centered rally. But bad luck was just behind the corner for the famous pizzaiolo, with a puncture seeing him slip down to tenth position in general standings, and a gap of 1 minute and 49 seconds to the provisional leader opening up. What's was surprising though was that Mirco Baldacci - called up for the occasion by the Fiat squad - took over as the provisional rally leader after the third special stage, and didn't relinquish the leadership right until the ultimate stage.
 

During the remaining part of the first leg, Basso and Baldacci alternated each other, winning all the stages with superbly quick times performed by their factory Fiat Punto rally cars. After the Fiat Super Special - Stage 9 - which measured only 3.6 km, Mirco Baldacci and his co-driver Giovanni Bernacchini were in a comfortable lead of the event with growing gap over Simon Jean-Joseph, and 1 minute and 40 seconds back to Giandomenico Basso and Mitia Dotta. In the meantime, the provisional 2005 FIA European Rally Championship leader, Renato Travaglia, had a puncture on SS7 Tekedag, which cost him more than three minutes and led to his exclusion from the final podium.

The next morning Giandomenico Basso opted for a total assault on the leaderboard in order to claim as many points as possible towards the European Championship. He went fastest on all the six stages that made up the second leg, recovering a lot of time in the process over the front runners. His gap over Simon Jean Joseph was in the process reduced from 1 minute 9.4 seconds, to just 17 in only six stages. However disappointment for Fiat occurred on the last stage, which Mirco Baldacci had started with a 15.7 advantage over the second placed Renault driver. The Sanmarinese driver had a puncture which saw him loose almost two minutes in the overall general classification and end abruptly his domination of this year's Fiat Rally. That puncture meant that Baldacci left the victory for Jean Joseph to collect, and score his first win of the year. The only bonus was that Giandomenico Basso moved from the third position to second position in the final classification, meaning two more vital points in the European Championship classification.

What was good news for Fiat in the event was the total dominance of the Fiat Punto Super1600 rally car, and its factory drivers, over the rest of the crews and cars on what was a strong entry list. The next round of European Rally Championship will be the Eko Rally, which will be held in Greece, from September 23rd to 25th.

by Marco Tenuti

European Rally Championship 2005 (after 7 on 9 rounds): 1st Renato Travaglia 40 points, 2nd Giandomenico Basso 29 points, 3rd Simon Jean-Joseph 21 points.