Whilst some people were competing on the Albemarle Targa rally, Jack Morton was assisting on the Monte Carlo WRC Rally. He was due to fly out immediately after the rally, but was asked to go out earlier so he had to withdraw from the No 2 position at Albemarle. Here is his tale.
Wednesday- Wednesday started with the shakedown. Pretty straight forward stage as it’s the stage they’ve used for many years. Conditions were wet so it was just a case of adding some mud from when they went through in the recce.
Thursday- Thursday’s 3 stages were in the evening. Conditions were fairly stable and there were just some small cuts to add and quite a lot of mud had been pulled onto the road from all the RNCs through the stage. Temperatures did drop by the time the guys came through so some black ice formed, which we tried to note down as much as possible when we drove through with the different surface changes and this is where Bryan’s experience came into play knowing where it would be.
Friday - Friday had 6 stages, 3 stages repeated. First stage was mainly in the shadow of mountains so temperatures were really low with ground temperature being -2 at stage start. So their was ice leading up to the stage and thinking that this will continue into the stage and melt as the sun came up, we decided to go in as late as possible to try and give the best conditions by the time Oliver came through. It seemed to worked as he was running 30 minutes after first car and the icey sections had melted quite alot which we marked in the notes and it worked as he set 4th fastest time overall. Rest of the stages were pretty consistent with small cuts added and some slippy sections. 2nd pass of stages a lot of mud/dirt had been brought out by cars so was a case of adding that into the notes for Elliott to amend for their notes.
Saturday - Saturday was another 3 stages repeated. Leaving the hotel at 6am to head to the first stage which was the longest stage of the event of 27km. Great stage, again alot of surface changes that we marked and no room for error. Again Bryan’s experience came into play with what he was adding in. 3rd stage of the loop I’ve never seen as many spectators even when we went through an hour and a half before first car. Thousands of people and with a lot of them walking across the road they brought a lot of mud onto the road which we had to mark down. The repeat of the stages in the afternoon went smoothly again just adding a lot of new cuts that the Rally1 boys take. They take cuts where you just don’t think they will.
Sunday - last day of the event and the earliest of starts. Leaving the hotel at 4.15 to get to the first stage at 5.10. The first 2 stages were repeats of the first 2 stages on Thursday evening and with it being so early in the morning temperatures were very cold. A lot of black ice in the first one which ended up catching out 2 of the Rally1 Toyota drivers. Second stage was more consistent less black ice but still tricky. Oliver won the stage in the class by over 20 seconds which was a very good effort. Last stage was the most famous of them all, Col de Turini. It was a very cool experience being on the stage with all the history it has from over the years. This was the most tricky stage of the weekend with the climb up the Col being dry/damp. But as soon as you reached the top and came down the other side with it being in the shade of the mountain ice/snow were the conditions. The difference in one stage was mad. We marked it as best we could coming again from Bryan’s experience. From the end of there we drove 2 hours 40 to meet the guys with my hire car and swap the recce car. I end drove 2 hours up to Lyon then back home so Sunday into Monday was a 23 hour day.. such a great experience on such an iconic event so I can’t be more grateful to Oliver and Elliott for the opportunity and look forward to the remaining tarmac rounds.
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