Isuzu Motorsports’ team leader Bruce Garland is facing a late night in the service park after an electrical gremlin halted his charge towards third place in the 2014 Australasian Safari.
Garland and long-time co-driver Harry Suzuki were happy with their pace on the first stage of Day Three of the seven-day cross-country rally across the West Australian outback when, without warning, their high-performance Dakar-spec Isuzu D-MAX ute simply stopped.
“The plan is to start tomorrow, but obviously we are bitterly disappointed because we were really in with a podium chance, and hoping for the top step,” said Garland, who was less than 20 seconds from third outright and first diesel when racing began this morning (Tuesday).
“We were going gangbusters, but not driving overly hard, when the D-MAX just came to a halt. It was like someone had turned off the ignition. Harry and I crawled all over it, but despite the fact we are pretty good bush mechanics there was nothing we could do. We had to get towed in.”
The Isuzu Motorsports crew is doing a full diagnostic check on the D-MAX tonight, with Garland and Suzuki planning to start again tomorrow.
“No matter what happens, we will finish this fantastic event, and we’ll also be giving as much support as we can to the rest of our guys, who are doing a great job,” Garland said.
The remaining two crews of the official Isuzu Motorsports team – and two other crews the team is supporting – have had a rough day, but all have finished strongly.
The West Australian duo of Adrian Di Lallo and Roger Pedersen and their production-class Isuzu MU-X wagon are in sixth outright while Thailand’s Olan Sornsirirat and Veerachai Thorangkoon – the third team in the official ‘Isuzu trio’ – have brought their production class D-MAX ute into 11th place.
“A tough and challenging day – very similar to a day at Dakar in that it knocked the bejesus out of you,” Di Lallo said.
“Navigation was rough and challenging. A creek came up faster than anticipated and I didn’t have time to back off the speed. We landed on one wheel vertical, did a pirouette and ended up on the other side of the fence without any of our aerials!
“So we had no radios, no navigation, nothing to tell distance besides the odometer – which isn’t accurate enough for racing – for 200km, and no communication. Aside from that, the car is performing really well and the tyres are good.”
Di Lallo’s co-driver, Rodger ‘Roj’ Pedersen described the day as a car breaker.
“It was like a rock field, very hard going and there’s lot of broken vehicles. We were flying down a fence line – Adrian reckons I called ‘700 caution creek’, but the creek came up early and caught us out. It was a moment, that’s for sure.
“We had no GPS, no rally safe, but it could’ve been a lot worse – we had the racing gods on our side. In hindsight, it was probably to our advantage that we lost the terratrip and communications because it made us back off a bit. The car is going great, considering what we put her through. There’s really not much work to do on it tonight.”
The other Isuzu MU-X which is being campaigned by Garland’s long-time mate, Reg Owen and co-driver Russell Cairns, is now in seventh while the Thai-entered D-MAX crewed by Vorapot Bunchuaylua and Chupong Chaiwan is in 10th (* all results provisional at time of writing).
Day Three was made up of two long stages (147.15km, 288.64km) which took competitors in a loop around Gascoyne Junction, which is 174km from the coast and around 965km north of the West Australian capital, Perth, where the event kicked off with a ceremonial start last Friday night.
Full competition began in Geraldton, 424km north of Perth on Sunday (September 21) and finishes in Kalbarri (592km north of Perth) on Saturday, September 27 after seven days and more than 3000km of endurance racing.
Tonight (Tuesday) is the second night in Gascoyne for the crews. Tomorrow, Day Four, consists of two stages (211.79km; 107.98km) to take competitors through to Exmouth where they will spend two nights. The town, which is 1270km north of Perth, is perched on the tip of WA’s North West Cape and is the gateway to the Ningaloo Coast World Heritage Area.
Isuzu Motorsports is a performance parts company owned by Garland and his long-time co-driver, Harry Suzuki. They also have support from Isuzu operations in Japan, Thailand and Australia, and from Toyo Tires, Royal Purple Oils and Disc Brakes Australia.
Overall result after day three of competition:
1. Steve Riley / John Doble – Holden VF – 2:42:36
2. Greg Scanlon / Liam Nunns – Nissan Patrol – 12:55:25
3. David McShane / William Hayes – Toyota Tacoma – 12:56:44
6. Adrian Di Lallo / Roger Pedersen – Isuzu MU-X – 13:46:20
7. Reg Owen / Russell Cairns – Isuzu MU-X – 13:50:19
10. V. Bunchuaylua / C. Chaiwan – Isuzu D-MAX – 15:23:29
11. O. Sornsirirat / V. Thorangkoon – Isuzu D-MAX – 16:18:49
