RALLY SWEDEN: DESPITE PACE, BLOCK OUT HOONS ALL AND WINS COLIN'S CREST AWARD
Colin’s Crest, a jump along the Vargåsen stage that was named after the late Colin McRae is without question the number one spectator attraction at Rally Sweden. It’s the one place over the 351 kilometers of stage roads, where the fans don’t care about how fast you’re going, but instead how big you are going. And of course, Monster World Rally Team’s Ken Block and Alex Gelsomino delivered exactly as expected. A 37- and 39-meter flight in the morning and afternoon running of this stage secured them the Colin’s Crest Award for longest jump.
“I am stoked we set the jump record for this rally and actually received an award for doing so, it proves that even on one of my worst days in a rally car, I can still out-hoon all of the top drivers,” said Ken Block. “I would imagine that would have made Colin proud. Now I just need to get up to speed on the snow. I knew coming into this rally it would be my toughest, but this first leg was extremely brutal, and my slowest day off the leaders in my WRC career.”
The start of stage 2 this morning came along with even colder temperatures and a few more inches of snow accumulation. The unusual amount of snowfall for WRC Sweden created very slick and varying conditions for the drivers. Sticking with the conservative approach, Block started out slow on the first stage of the day, but quickly improved his pace, jumping from 3.9 seconds per kilometer off the lead drivers to averaging around 2.3 seconds per kilometer throughout the rest of the day. Block and Gelsomino finished the day 18th overall.
“Rally Sweden is a notoriously difficult rally and must be respected,” said team manager Derek Dauncey. “It’s a unique event on the schedule and our goal from day one was to come here and learn it the best we could. We knew we weren’t going to just show up and match our gravel and tarmac pace here on the snow. That said, I am quite pleased with Ken’s performance today. While it might not reflect in his overall placing, he showed major improvement from the first stage to the last stage, and I expect to see this continue throughout the event. From a development standpoint, this was a good day.”
Block and Gelsomino return Saturday morning to tackle the second leg of stages of Rally Sweden. Follow the team throughout all of Rally Sweden, here and on Twitter and Facebook.
Credit: Monster World Rally Team (www.monsterworldrallyteam.com)
No comments:
Post a Comment