Conrad Rautenbach - Rally review

FIA World Rally Championship, round 13/15 Ajaccio, Corsica 

After a near-perfect build up to one of his favourite rounds of the World Rally Championship, reigning FIA African Rally Champion Conrad Rautenbach's determined drive on the Tour de Corse was ruined by two punctures on the second day.

The tortuously twisty roads which zigzag their way across France's Mediterranean island are among Conrad's favourite in the world. Devoid on experience of driving a Citroen C4 WRC in this kind of terrain, Rautenbach and his British co-driver had finished second on the Corte Rally, a round of the Corsican Championship, in the run-up to the main event. But, in the thick of the fight for seventh place at the pinnacle of world rallying, Conrad's hopes of adding to the impressive points tally he started with fourth overall on the Rally of Argentina earlier in the season, were dashed.

The brace of punctures cost him more than five minutes; a lifetime in a sport decided by tenths of seconds. His hopes of bouncing back on the final day with some top times were dashed when he struggled with the car's handing in some of the wider sections of the stages. The split times in the twisty and technical sections of the Sunday tests demonstrated Conrad's confidence and ability with the car, but not even a mid-day damper set-up change could help on the wide stuff.

Despite his problems, Conrad battled on valiantly to bring the PH Sport-run C4 WRC home 14th, ahead of Ford driver Henning Solberg and close to the factory Suzuki of Toni Gardemeister. He ended the rally on a positive note posting eighth quickest on the final stage, despite having throttled back for the finish.

"I was really looking forward to this one. I was pretty confident of points coming to this event. I knew the pace we had driven at in Catalunya and I knew what I was capable of in Corsica this week. It's just so frustrating. The first puncture came not far after the start [of SS9]. There was a tricky right over crest into a first gear left-hander.

I was concentrating on the first part of the sequence and we hit something with the front-right. I guess it's something I should have picked up on the recce. We stopped the change the tyre, but then David had trouble undoing the straps which hold the spare wheel in place, so it took us three minutes to change.

"As if that wasn't enough, we then clipped a kerb with the right-rear tyre in stage 11 and caught out second puncture of the day. Actually, this was our third as we'd left lunchtime service with a slow puncture on the car as well. We stopped to change in 11.

The good news this time was that we improved our tyre-changing time by one minute! This just wasn't what I'd expected from this event at all. The way things have gone, we'd have been right in the points, but that – as they say – is rallying. Doesn't make it any easier though.

"Now it's Japan and another new one for me. Then again, it's a new one for everybody – let's get over there and see what we can do."

-CR Media -