MATTHEW HIRST

RALLY NORTH WALES AND WYEDEAN STAGES WINNER 2019

The Motorsport News Chris Ingram Rally Challenge has been great fun. I’m happy with my performance in Greece to finish 24th, although in hindsight I wish I’d pushed harder on that last stage as I had a disconnection issue on the one before and thought my time hadn’t saved, but it had.

Previously when doing these events, I’ve been spending a lot of time practicing the stages beforehand but before Greece I took the view that I’d do it all blind; all in one night and one sitting. When you start learning the stages, you’re not really practicing rallying anymore, you quickly fall into a circuit racing mindset which doesn’t translate to real life.

Competing, albeit in virtual reality, is definitely useful. From the most basic level it’s keeping me inspired and motivated but on an actual physical level it’s great for your reactions and coordination. But thinking about car set-up has been the really big thing for me.

For example, I’ve not been paying enough attention to the in-game stage degradation. You kind of find that the optimum set-up to run is having the car low on the rideheight and stiff on the springs just like real life which is fine when you’re first car on the road, but when you’ve got big ruts that you’ve not anticipated you run the risk of losing time on two wheels or, worse still, rolling. That is something that I’ve not really been paying enough attention to in real life either: that basic rideheight to stage degradation equation if you like.

I think these online championships are great for the sport and I think it’s a shame we’ve not embraced it sooner. It’s been glaring at us, this opportunity to get people involved a bit more. People from all aspects of the sport such as photographers and officials as well as drivers have been taking part in it and it’s been a positive change for the community to interact with each other more.

Naturally I do tend to focus on where the real-life drivers are. Chris Ingram is a hero of mine considering what he’s achieved so far, so I class the opportunity of competing against him as a privilege. I eagerly await the challenge of the final round in

Scotland as I love those stages.