2003-2004
Early in the year, DVY had gone off to Melvyn Evans for a general tidy up and came back painted in a lovely blue colour donated by a friend
By the time the engine was sorted, it was too late for a shakedown rally, but we did Builth in Fly as we hadn't done a rally since Millbrook the year before
Then, after quite a few laps of the local lanes, it was back to West Cork for the 25th Anniversary of that event. Seeded lower down at 90 we had a cracking 2 days rallying, DVY was running perfectly, and except for nearly rolling it into a ball on a flat 4th gear right hander and putting a tiny crease in the new paint job at the next bale chicane, we were very happy to finish 43rd overall and 6th in class out of the 150 entries. This was a lot worse overall but the same class position as in 2000 showing how many more WRC cars were running at the head of the field
The only time DVY used to lift a wheel was in Ireland due to the softer springs
After that I entered the Chieftan Sprint at Longcross in May, winning my class easily and set 3rd FTD behind Steve Broughton (of SBD) and his friend double driving their 1700cc Vauxhall powered Westfield, which had as much power as I did
Nice pic from the Sprint
But Millbrook was cancelled in 2003 and with the court case and working in Bristol instead of London since July 2002, money was a bit tight, so DVY stayed in the shed for the rest of the year
In 2004 things weren't much better, and even though David and Richard offered to help with the expenses for West Cork we decided we couldn't afford to go, so it was May 2004 before DVY came out again
There was no need to tax her, so I did a few laps of our 9 acre field to make sure everything was running perfectly
Then it was off to Millbrook where we bumped into Cath Woodman for the first time in years, who was co-driving for Windy on his first ever Stage Rally
After a good battle all day, Windy and Cath finished 19th / 3rd while we were 22nd / 6th only really setting good times in the afternoon when I'd remembered how to drive
And the usual jump shot
Soon after Millbrook, Carrie and I sat down and made the difficult decision to sell DVY, the mortgage being more important than having 2 rally cars (FLY will never be sold ) and I joined Turbosport as part of trying to sell her
The price was £15k and we had a few people round, one in particular I remember was looking for his first rally car, but after I took him for a ride up the main road to the local garage, turned round and came back drifting round the corners flat in 4th, he decided DVY was too quick for him
A few months later and still no buyers, Carrie put an ad on British Rally Forum asking for offers for all or parts of DVY and after a few calls, Rupert Lomax came round one Friday afternoon in August, liked what he saw and came back 8am Saturday morning with £8k and helped us remove the engine, gearbox, seats, harnesses, exhaust, radiator, fan, etc and took her home
In October that year he entered his local forestry event, the Cambrian Rally, and was leading his class before his John Hardman Vauxhall engine had problems (I said he should have bought the Cossie )
And a pic of Rupert on that event
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