The event was held at Forrest Estate in South West Scotland
with the crews facing 14 runs of a testing 8 miles long course.
Round 2 winner Andrew West set the pace early on but he was
forced out on run 4 when the ball joint knuckle broke away from the lower arm
which pulled the shaft from the diff, smashed the inner cv joint and split the
brake pipe. Ryan Cooke took over the lead in his Milner LRM-1, closely pursued
by Martin Cox. By the end of the nine runs on a very wet day one Cooke led by
48 seconds. Moran, in his AT 4x4 Indy Challenger, was a further 40 seconds back
in third.
Casualties on day one included Paul Garner who had
transmission problems in his GSR V10 and Andy Powell who retired to prevent
further damage to a slipping gearbox. Powell’s navigator Phil Ibbotson had
travelled overnight to get to the venue after his truck broke down on the A75
on Friday afternoon.
By the third run of day two Cox had moved into a two second
lead but a puncture on the fourth run handed the lead back to Cooke. However,
as well as suffering a puncture himself, Cooke had also damaged his exhaust and
he was forced to back off on the final run of the event. This should’ve allowed
Cox to take the win but he had a broken throttle cable and was forced to
manually operate the accelerator with a cable through the window to get out of
the course. Cox’s misfortune meant that it was Moran who came through to win
ahead of Cooke with Paul Myers in third.
“I’m lost for words,” said Moran. “I’ve been sat behind Ryan
and Martin all weekend, just keeping on going while they battled for the lead.
They were both very unfortunate to have problems on the last runs. It’s
unbelievable that after around 115 miles of competition the win was by one
second.”
“Martin actually lent me a coilover after I broke one on my
car, that shows what sportsmanship we have in the BCCC. It’s been a great
event, a very good course with some nice fast sections. We’ve had three
different winners in three events so it’s looking like it will be a great
championship battle this year.”
The throttle cable issue dropped Cox to sixth as he had to
take a maximum time on the final run.
“I was having a great battle with Ryan and I’d just managed
to get into the lead but we had the puncture and then early on in the final run
the throttle cable snapped,” said Cox. “We stopped and managed to thread a
cable into the car so we were able to get to the finish but we had lost so much
time we had to take a maximum.”
“It’s gutting to lose a potential win like that, we’ll go
home now and lick our wounds and get ready for the next round.”
Steve Smith brought his JRG Clio home in fourth ahead of the
Isuzu D-Max of Jason Sharpe. Mark Jacques finished behind Cox in 7th
with Richard Green in 8th in his Tomcat. The final BCCC finisher was
Paul Harris who overcame electrical problems and a broken shaft on his Bristol Street Motors-supported GSR
Maxilight on day one.
In the Freelander Challenge Ian Linford was victorious ahead
of Ian Letman, who survived losing a wheel on one run. The Race2Recovery team,
who won the first two rounds, had engine problems on the recce lap which
prevented them completing a full competitive lap.
Jon Damrel won the Clubman category in his Tornado.
BCCC Results
1. Mike Moran/Tony
Coid (AT 4x4 Indy Challenger) 02:27 572. Ryan Cooke/Lee Channing (Milner LRM-1) 02:27:58
3. Paul Myers/Martin Myers (Land Rover Tornado) 02:31:41
4. Steve Smith/John Griffiths (JRG Indy Clio V8) 02:33:48
5. Jason Sharpe/Russell Sharpe (Isuzu D-Max) 02:35:27
6. Martin Cox/Paul Carson (GSR 206 Evo 9) 02:41:12
7. Mark Jacques/Simon Last (3M Challenger) 02:43:28
8. Richard Green/Richard Griffiths (Tomcat 100) 02:46:37
9. Paul Harris/Mark Phelps (GSR Maxilight) 02:56:38
