VIRTUAL RALLY BATTLE KICKS OFF IN EARNEST
MN Chris Ingram Challenge action
He may have had to settle for a place off the podium in the DIRT Rally
2.0 World Series back in January, but there was no stopping Lukas Mateja on the opening round of the Motorsport News Chris Ingram Rally Challenge, the Michelin Monte Carlo Rallye.
Equipped with Volkswagen’s Polo GTI R5, the Czech driver - competing as Crsedmicky stormed to a 31.4-second victory with the rest of the top 10 split by a similar margin.
While the harbour in Monaco only has capacity for 60 cars in real life, there are no such concerns in the virtual world meaning an astronomical 1538 R5 cars started. And to prove just how demanding the Monte is, a third of those starters never made it to the end of all nine special stages.
To illustrate the point, WRC class winner Bernardo Sousa was one of the victims.
The opening test – Col de Turini – Sprint en Descente – proved that all pre-event speculation about the competition being outrageous was indeed correct. Just 10s covered the top 74 runners on stage one, with Mateja heading the pack by a shade over a second. As the rally headed down the other side of the famous Col, it was still Mateja setting the pace and he was now into a 2.9s lead.
Further scratch times on three, four and five swelled his advantage to 13.3s as an almighty jostle for position occurred behind. Italian Nickardi was into second ahead of Japanese driver Kazunokota and Virtual ERC Azores winner Pedro Silva.
Stage six – Col de Turini – Depart en Descente – would be Mateja’s first defeat as he shipped 0.3s to Kazunokota but he was back setting the pace on the following three tests to record a near-perfect run on the icy mountain roads above Monaco.
Kazunokota came very close to snatching second place from Nickardi on the final Vallee Descendante stage with a time that was nearly five seconds quicker, but instead had to settle for third, a whisker over a second behind.
Portuguese ace Silva was fourth and delighted with that: “Monte Carlo has never really been my playground but I enjoyed taking part in this event this time around. I am pleased to have my time card delivered at the last stage,” he said.
“It was absolutely memorable climbing Route de Turini at night with soft, worn tyres; definitely the most challenging stage of my career by far. In the end, the risky tyre strategy paid off as I was able to achieve good pace on the dry Tarmac and gain a bit of time there.”
Jamie Moone was the top Brit in ninth overall, 10 spots ahead of Scottish motorsport photographer Alan Scott who edged Junior WRC driver and former WRC Esports champion Jon Armstrong by 1.3s.
“On stage two I lost my headlights after a crash so had to do the night stage blind,” Armstrong rued. “Had good pace on some stages [but] had an accident a few kilometres from the end of the rally so limped home with a punctured tyre.”
In what was a rally dominated by Polo R5s, the first non-vw was to be found in 31st place. That was European Rally champion Chris Ingram in his Skoda Fabia R5. But Ingram made a mistake on the final stage too, clouting the rock face in a tunnel which dropped him behind BTRDA frontrunner Matthew Hirst overall.
Incredibly, Hirst made a mistake of his own though with a half-spin, but was a second quicker to finish 0.3s ahead: “I’m 14 seconds off Jon Armstrong which I will take considering this is my first attempt at an esport event. It’s encouraging being not too far away.”
Fellow BTRDA regular and previous Trackrod Rally winner Mat Smith “struggled with car set-up for the changeable conditions” but sealed a strong 80th place in his Polo; nine places behind World RX esports winner and 2016 JBRC contender Mattias Adielsson and 11 spots from Turkish champion Orhan Avcioglu..
“I’m flat out at work at the moment and just started planting spuds so practice is likely to be non-existent for the next couple of rounds,” Smith added. “Just lining up a couple of excuses!”
British Rally champion Matt Edwards finished 103rd, with fellow Welshman and Irish Tarmac frontrunner Meirion Evans 41s back in 152nd. Italian champion Andrea Crugnola was 294th in his Citroen C3 R5.