21.10.2007 RENATO TRAVAGLIA TAKES HIS FIRST WIN IN THE GRANDE PUNTO ABARTH

VOLKAN ISIK - GRANDE PUNTO ABARTH S2000
RENATO TRAVAGLIA - GRANDE PUNTO ABARTH S2000

Renato Travaglia (above) claimed his first win at the wheel of the Grande Punto Abarth S2000 this afternoon on the 42nd Rally d'Antibes, but for Volkan Işık (top) a fighting third place wasn't enough to win the FIA European Rally Championship title.

Renato Travaglia claimed his first win at the wheel of the Grande Punto Abarth S2000 this afternoon on the 42nd Rally d'Antibes, but for Volkan Işık, a fighting third place wasn't enough for the Turk to claim the 2007 FIA European Rally Championship title.

Işık came into this 10th and final round of the FIA European Rally Championship with 48 points, just one short of Simon Jean-Joseph, after the Turk had turned in a storming drive to victory on the last round of the series, the ELPA Rally in Greece, which he dominated, and during which he showed impressive speed on his less favoured surface, asphalt.

However coming to France for the series' conclusion the odds were really stacked against Isik. His French rival, a former national rally champion who knows these roads so well, was at the wheel of the nimble Class A6 Citroën C2, and with dry conditions prevailing on the stages, many of which are used by the Monte Carlo Rally, he would be an almost impossible task for Isik to wrest the advantage.

After 18 stages, split into three legs comprising of six stages each, Jean-Joseph and Jack Boyere finished in second place 1 minute and 41.3 seconds ahead of Işık, who was third, to wrap up the title for the second time (he first won it in 2004 in a Renault Clio S1600). Jean-Joseph takes over the title from Giandomenico Basso who won it last year in a Grande Punto Abarth, during the car's debut season.

However Işık, a former multiple Turkish Rally Champion, who has Kaan Ozsenler alongside in the co-driver's seat, can take much credit away from his ERC performances this year, and in truth, his result on this rally was much better than onlookers had predicted. In his first full season in the Europe series with the Super2000 category Grande Punto Abarth, run by Fiat Motorsports Turkey, he has simply got faster and faster all year long, maturing rapidly as a driver and becoming highly proficient on his less favoured surfaces. If Işık returns to tackle the ERC next year, having now got his 'learning' year successfully under his belt, he will certainly start as one of the title favourites.

At the front of the rally the highly experienced former double ERC champion (2002 and 2005) Renato Travaglia didn't put a foot wrong, leading from SS1 to the chequered flag, to take his first rally win at the wheel of the Grande Punto Abarth. The Italian built up a lead of 29.7 seconds by the end of leg one, at the conclusion of the second leg it was 1:49.4, and at the finish line it has grown to a massive 2:13.0. A difficult season blighted by retirements and exclusions served to end the experienced Italian's bid for a third European title.

Behind the top trio of Travaglia, Jean-Joseph and
Işık, came Polish crew Michal Solowow and Maciek Baran in the Cersanit Rally Team's Grande Punto Abarth. He was 5:12.6 adrift of the rally winner at the chequered flag. And making it four Abarth finishers in the first five was the French crew of Philippe Mermet and Gerard Clerton (+6:28.5). ERC regulars, Corrado Fontana and Renzo Casazza, had a very difficult rally, receiving a 2 minute penalty for being late to the start of SS1 which left them at the back of the field. By the end of leg 1 they had battled back up to 7th place, but their fine recovery ended with mechanical problems during the middle leg.

© 2007 Interfuture Media/Italiaspeed