Eventsigns Mewla Rally (Epynt) - Sunday 29th August
After a few single venue events over the summer and not having the budget for a 2nd trip to Ireland this year I was looking for a bigger event to do and the Mewla came up at the right time
I'd done 3 events over Epynt in '96 & '97 in a GpN RS2000 but it struggled a bit on the uphill sections so I was looking forward to having a go in DVY. Holly was codriving again, her first time on notes for 4 years so we booked in for the recce the day before and bought some notes from Brian Patterson
We did the recce in the service van and soon got left behind by the rest of the convoy we were in but by mid afternoon the notes were all checked and we headed back to the Royal Welsh Showground for scrutineering which was passed without any problems
Saturday had been nice and sunny, but Sunday dawned overcast and it was drizzling steadily. Carrie and Guy were servicing and they arrived early to take the van up to the service area on the ranges. DVY was sitting on slicks and as we left the showground on the first road section the weather got worse and worse turning into heavy rain. This road section took us through service and we worked out we had 8 minutes to change to the new Dunlop X22 wets Once I'd remembered which one went where it all went smoothly and we got through the forest to Stage 1 with a few minutes to spare
Stage 1 - 8.75 miles - 10:46
This one started just up from Tirabad on the yellow road, went through the German Village, then back across to the roads on the West of the ranges before finishing back on the Yellow a little bit up from Dixies. We started off well, having plenty of grip from the tyres with Holly calling the notes well and after about 6 miles we overtook Brian Davies' Corolla (we found out later he was taken ill) and then with about a mile to go we were caught by the Corolla of Gareth 'Shonky' Jones (a very successful Road Rally competitor) who had started 30s behind us. Our time put us 60th out of the 100 cars which had started the event
Stage 2 - 9.30 miles - 11:51
After a 1/2 mile road section it was straight into Stage 2 which used the very twisty Burmah Road before heading East onto the more open sections of the ranges. No problems on this one either, the heated screen was working well but I had to back off a couple of times as it was raining so hard the wipers couldn't keep up
Back in service we checked everything and topped up with petrol before heading back through the forest to Stage 3
Stage 3 - 19.90 miles - 21:42
This was Stage 1 and Stage 2 with the road section in between run competitively and at just under 20 miles was easily the longest stage I'd done for many years. There was a long delay at the start as someone had gone off in Stage 1 about 10 cars after us causing the stage to be stopped and the ambulance was sent in as the codriver was unconscious (the crew are both ok now). Holly wandered up to get the arrival time while I chatted to Shonky and a few of the other drivers. Everything got under way again and we could see the first few cars going into the first corner with clouds of spray coming off them
We started this one behind the Road Rally spec Mk1 Escort of Phil Evans and after about 15 miles he was in sight although it was another couple of miles before I caught him and he let us past. Going up the next straight the intermittent misfire returned and he caught us up again and followed us over the finish, but our time was good enough to be 44th quickest
I was really enjoying it by now and would have happily done another 20 miles without a break
Back to service again, Holly and I fitted a new set of plugs while Guy checked all the suspension and Carrie cut some heat shield which we fitted round the coil in case that was getting too hot
Stage 4 - 13.35 miles - 14:13
This was a shortened version of Stage 3 with a couple of loops missed out. The heavy rain had eased now but the roads were still very wet and this time we were caught by the Mk1 who had finally sorted out his throttle linkage problems. Watching him from behind was very interesting, he was going into the corners a lot faster than I dared, getting the front turned in nicely and just drifting the back round, and flicking it through the chicanes in a similar manner
The misfire still happened a couple of times but wasn't slowing us down that much so I didn't bother trying anything else in service, we just checked everything again and had some lunch
Stage 5 - 11.25 miles - 11:33
Going in the reverse direction now from East to West but headed up from fourways to finish just after the German village. In service it was still overcast so I hadn't thought about changing the tyres, the X22's still having loads of life left, but the roads were now drying quickly and about 8 miles into the stage everything got a bit twitchy as they started to overheat so I backed off slightly. Coming down the slope out of the German Village which had been made slippery by people cutting the corner in the other direction there was a BMW buried in the trees with only his boot showing so I was very careful round here
Stage 6 - 4.1 miles - 4:49
A short road section took us to Stage 6 which looped back onto the Burmah Road before finishing on a little used section near to Llandeilo'r Fan. The tyres had cooled enough by now so we had plenty of grip all the way through. Near the finish there was a big jump into a bus stop chicane, we hardly got off the ground, but a few others took the jump flat out and went straight through the chicane and got a minute penalty - there's a good video of this on Youtube
Holly was really enjoying herself now as well, getting used to how far ahead she needed to be on the notes and we were going a lot quicker now that the sun was out
Back through the forest to the last service which was a short one and we fitted the slicks for the last loop
Stage 7 - 11.1 miles - 11:16
A repeat of Stage 5 and we were only 17s quicker on the slicks which shows how much grip the softer wets had before they got too hot. Strangely the misfire had gone completely now so I'm not sure it is heat related
Stage 8 - 4.1 miles - 4:39
A repeat of Stage 6 and a good one to finish with, everything went well, I just need a bit more commitment over some of the crests
Then the final drive back to the finish at the showground and to get the results
We finished 38th overall and 11th in class (out of 21), had a very enjoyable day and I'm sure we'll go back to Epynt next year
Many thanks to Carrie and Guy for their work in service and to Holly for doing a great job on the notes
Plenty of pics to follow, but I didn't bother with the in car as you need special permission and we had enough to worry about without it
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