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Abarth's challenge for honours on the 39th Barum
Czech Rally Zlín crumbled in treacherous
conditions yesterday afternoon as Giandomenico
Basso crashed out while in a podium position.
Meanwhile a spin and a puncture as well as wrong
tyre choices dropped his factory team mate Luca
Rossetti down the order to eighth place, the
best of the Abarth runners, going into today's
final leg. Basso's crash deals a severe blow to
his Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) title
aspirations which only came back into the frame
thanks to a hard fought win last time out in
Madeira. Basso's demise also leaves the way
clear for his closest rival in the FIA European
Rally Championship (ERC), Michal Solowow, to
collect maximum points and elbow the Italian off
the top of the standings as the rally counts
towards both championships.
Following Friday
night's Superspecial (SS1) on the streets of Zlín, Leg One
of the Barum Czech Rally Zlín started very early yesterday
morning with the 19.1 km SS2 and neither Abarth factory
driver was happy. "It’s very bumpy," reported Basso as he
posted the fourth quickest time overall. "There are many
jumps with various with hard landings. The grass along the
roads also causes trouble," added the Italian who dropped
down the classification one place to fourth, overhauled by a
hard charging Nicolas Vouilloz (Peugeot 207 S2000). Rossetti
only managed the ninth best time and he dropped from his
overnight fourth, to sixth place. "The stage is difficult
especially regarding the brakes," said the reigning ERC
champion. The four private Abarth runners were also
reporting mixed fortunes. Jaromír Tarabus, who is
benefitting from a latest-specification FPT engine as well
as factory service support on the event was cautious and
looking to make it further than he did last year: "We didn’t
finish this stage last year, this year we’re trying to get
better time, we'll see what comes next," said the Czech who
gained three places overall to climb to fourteenth.
Countryman Jaroslav Orsák in a JM Engineering Zlín run
Abarth Grande Punto was going the other way, sliding from
fourteenth to seventeenth after losing time, "We’ve been
enjoying it so far but the car is a bit damaged," the
youngster reported.
Into SS3 and
another fifth fastest time for Basso kept him in fourth
place while despite only being eleventh quickest Rossetti
moved up a place to fifth thanks to a loss of 30 seconds for
the factory-entered Skoda Fabia S2000 of Juho Hanninen.
Basso's quest for advantage in the ERC points classification
was also boosted when title chasing rival Corrado Fontana
ripped a wheel off his Peugeot 207 S2000 on the tricky stage
and retired. Tarabus remained in fourteenth place despite a
flapping tailgate. "I was wondering why we had so much dust
in the car, after we got to the finish I realised that the
boot was open," he said. Polish driver Grzegorz Grzyb in
another JM Engineering Zlín-run Abarth Grande Punto however
lost nine places. "We had a puncture," he reported.
Meanwhile Marco Cavigioli in his Italian Super 2000 machine
was continuing to suffer problems and had an off on the
stage. "We got out of the route but we managed to get back,"
said the reigning IRC 2WD champion who was now down in
thirty fifth place.
Basso was fourth
fastest again on SS4 but with Vouilloz exiting the rally
after his car caught fire following a broken engine mounting
which severed the fuel lines, the Italian was promoted up to
third. Worryingly the slow starting IRC points leader Kris
Meeke (Peugeot 207 S2000) was now on a big charge and he set
the fastest time over the 22.47 km stage and was closing in
on the Abarth star. "The set up of our car wasn’t good,"
reported Basso. "We must made some changes." Team mate
Rossetti was twelfth quickest on the stage which saw him
drop from fifth to sixth place, passed by the former three
times winner of this rally Roman Kresta (Peugeot 207 S2000).
Tarabus was starting to experience problems with his car
though and despite posting fifteenth quickest on SS4 he
reported that "before we got to the service park, the
starting gear stopped working," and that the crew had be
forced to push the car into the service park. Grzyb and
Cavigioli both put recent problems behind them to each make
up four positions on the overall leaderboard on SS4 which
left them standing in twenty fourth and thirty first
positions respectively at the halfway point of the opening
leg.
SS5 saw the
crews making a second pass of the 19.13 km Pindula stage
which had kicked off proceedings in the morning as the rally
began a second loop of the opening three stages and
immediately Rossetti was in trouble, a spin costing him 43.2
seconds to the stage winning Jan Kopecký who was by this
point running away with the rally lead in the factory Skoda
Fabia. "We made a spin but the car seems to be ok. We don’t
know yet. Unfortunately, we lost a lot," reported Rossetti
who slid out of the top-ten as a result. Basso though had no
problems to report and went second quickest, his fastest
time of the rally, and this allowed him to increase the
cushion he had over fourth placed Meeke to 23.9 seconds
while also chipping half a second off second placed Loix.
Despite being landed with a 20 second penalty Tarabus gained
a position overall to climb into thirteenth place, but was
also reporting increasing problems with his Abarth's engine.
"We went through the stage ok but the engine stopped working
in the service park and we couldn’t start it, so we got a
penalty," said the Czech. "We’re trying not to turn the
engine." Also reporting mechanical problems was fellow
countryman Orsak. "This stage was ok," said the Czech
driver. "We just had problems with the stabiliser, we
believe everything will be good from now on." It still
didn't stop him moving up a place to sixteenth overall,
while also moving up the order were Grzyb and Cavigioli, the
Pole breaking into the top twenty for the first time after
climbing up five places with the fifteenth fastest time on
the stage, while the Italian was up three places into twenty
eighth.
The Abarth crews
suffered more problems as the rally went through SS6,
running for the first time, which marked the three quarter
point of the day's frenetic action and the conclusion of the
second two-stage section of the day. And as the Abarth crews
heading into service it was Rossetti who had suffered most
on the stage. After losing time with a spin on the previous
stage Rossetti lost even more time on this test (23.1
seconds to stage winner Kopecký) with a puncture, although
with Skoda Fabia driver Pavel Valoušek losing 1 minute and
42 seconds with engine problems on the same stage it
actually promoted the Italian one place up the order and
squeezed him back into the top-ten. "It’s not good,"
reported a disappointed Rossetti, we had a puncture and we
also made a spin, we needed the help from the spectators to
come out of the ditch." Team mate Basso also struggled on
the stage and was only sixth fastest, although this added up
to a deficit of just 6.2 seconds to the factory Skoda driver
making all the pace at the front. "We pushed hard on Pindula
[SS5] and our time was ok," said Basso, who is the reigning
Italian Rally Champion, "but then we lost our time in SS 6.
We lost similar time as last year when this stage was held
in the reverse direction," he added. The six Abarth entries
on the rally became five as Tarabus' mechanical problems
overcame his car and he was forced to retire on the 14.86 km
test. None of the Abarth runners were really happy and Grzyb
reported that: "after the puncture at Halenkovice we got out
of the route twice, which cost us a minute; the car is ok."
However he was still able to make up more positions and move
up to sixteenth overall, one place behind Orsák who was
worried about his car. "I have been working since morning,"
said the Czech youngster. "We mend something after each
stage. At the moment the gear box leaks oil, so I am not
really happy." Vladimír Barvík (Mitsubishi Evo IX) then
crashed out and the stage was stopped before Cavigioli was
able to make a pass; however his notional time was good
enough to promote him two places to twenty sixth overall as
he continued to chip away at the leaderboard.
Into SS7 and the
weather started to turn for the worse, making the unique
dirty asphalt of this rally even more tricky. Both Abarth
factory drivers struggled through the 17.39 km long test,
the second running of the Halenkovic stage, which was made
more difficult as the surface had been chewed up when the
field had passed through for the first time earlier in the
day. Basso and Rossetti posted the ninth and eleventh
fastest times respectively which however kept the in third
and tenth place overall on the leaderboard. "It started
raining and we chose wrong tyres," admitted Rossetti while
Basso was more upbeat: "It's very slippery but everything
else is ok," said the winner of the last round of the IRC
and ERC in Madeira earlier this month. Of the three
surviving private Abarths, Orsák was upset with his car: "We
have big problems with the gearbox," he reported, although
with IRC regular Franz Wittmann (Mitsubishi Evo IX) losing a
massive four-and-a-half minutes with a puncture it moved
Orsák up one place overall to fourteenth, while Grzyb right
behind also cracked the top-fifteen for the first time.
Further back Cavigioli made up another two places to twenty
fourth.
The penultimate
stage of the day, SS8, saw it all go horribly wrong for
Basso. With the weather conditions deteriorating and the
crews suffering from the wet and dry sections on the stage,
the Italian crashed out and in doing so it dealt a huge blow
to his IRC title hopes. Only eight cars went through as the
stage was cancelled following Basso's crash due to co-driver
Mitia Dotta accidentally pressing the GPS emergency switch.
Rossetti also struggled and posted the slowest of the eight
runners' times that were recorded before his team mate's
crash. "The changing conditions cause us trouble,"
complained Rossetti, echoing the comments of most of the
drivers, "the dry and wet roads between the forests."
Rossetti, now the sole surviving factory Abarth runner, posted
a decent sixth fastest time through the last stage of the day (SS9), and with Basso's
departure and problems for Václav Pech (Mitsubishi Evo IX) it left the Italian
in eighth place at the end of the first leg, albeit 2 minutes 50.9 seconds
adrift of
the rally leader. Only the Skoda Fabia of Evgeny Novikov one place ahead is in
striking distance of the Italian (the gap is 8.9 seconds) so Rossetti will have
to drive carefully and hope for misfortune from the faster runners if he is to
make his way up the leaderboard on today's final leg. Best placed of the surviving
private Abarth trio overnight was Gryzb, the experienced Pole continued to
improve all day, and he posted the ninth fastest time on final stage to overhaul
JM Engineering Zlín team mate Orsák and grab thirteenth spot overall. "We had big problems with
the car, first the stabilisers and then the gearbox," said fourteenth placed
Orsák at the end of SS9. "I hope we will start competing tomorrow, but we did
our best, we'll see tomorrow," he added. Cavigioli had an unpromising run on the
final test of the leg and he lost two places. The Italian will thus start this
morning from twenty fifth place overall.
At the front of the rally it was all about Kopecký who took six stage wins from the eight
yesterday in a towering
performance. The extremely fast and often very rough stages were described by
the Skoda Motorsport driver as ‘brutal’ with no quarter being given among the
leading contenders. Nevertheless he was able to build his lead through the day
despite losing stage victories to Meeke and his team
mate Hanninen.
Second place at the overnight halt was held by Loix, the Belgian Peugeot
driver having run consistently in the top group throughout the day. Loix
nevertheless goes into today's day fighting a rearguard action against the
Peugeot UK entry of championship leader Meeke.
Having started the day in thirty third place, Meeke charged up into fourth place over
the first three stages of the day. Thereafter he found it difficult to close in
on the top three runners despite winning SS4, but as conditions worsened his
pace improved and, with Basso's dramatic departure from the event
on SS8, he holds third place and is just 8.4 seconds behind Loix.
Fourth place went to the second works Skoda of Hanninen, who won Friday
night's city centre stage in Zlín and SS6, but struggled to maintain his pace in
between these two victories. He nevertheless recovered and today will have to
battle
to hold off the Peugeot of three-time Kresta.
Having initially struggled to acclimatise to his new Peugeot 207 S2000, BF
Goodrich Drivers Team entry of Prokop has got up to speed and has climbed up
to sixth place at the overnight halt, ahead of fellow WRC regular
Novikov. Behind Rossetti in ninth place is the leading Ralliart contender, local man Pech.
In the IRC 2WD Cup local driver Egon Smekal holds the advantage for Honda after
fellow Honda competitors, Dutchman Marcel Piepers and Norwegian Martin Knudsen
both crashed out. Smekal leads fellow Czech driver Jiri Skoupil by the narrowest
of margins in his Fiat Punto S1600, with another Honda belonging to Hungary's Laszlo Vizin
third. Czech driver Jan Šlehofer, who won the 2WD class last year, made a hugely
impressive start in his Fiat Punto S1600 and was the early
category leader, but he dropped out yesterday morning with
driveshaft problems between SS2 and SS3. Also of note is a
real battling performance from the Alfa 147 of Martin Rada,
he chipped his way up the leaderboad all day and was an
impressive fifty second overall overnight. Just 72 crews
survived the treacherous opening leg.
ItaliaspeedTV:
Shakedown Stage /
Scrutineering /
Ceremonial Start /
Superspecial Stage (SS1)
/
Star Rally /
Leg One (I) /
Leg One (II)
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