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24 year old Stephen Petch junior is apprehensively looking forward to making his World Rally Car tarmac debut on this weekends notoriously unforgiving RBS Manx International Rally on board his SG Petch Motorsport run Hyundai Accent WRC.
County Durham based Stephen, who is co-driven by Michael Wilkinson, has had mixed results from his numerous trips to the island but, typically, the young pilot shows strong form on the many narrow and twisty lanes that make up the bulk of the stages. In the past Stephen has been used to hustling a Production spec Mitsubishi Evo around the island, but this year he has made the step up to the more sophisticated world rally car machinery. The Hyundai, an ex works car, should go well here. However minimal tarmac testing will present Stephen with his biggest hurdle. As such the 2007 Mitsubishi Evo Challenge Junior Champion aims to take a steady approach and learn the car.
“No heroics this weekend. I love the car, and it really suits my driving style. I’ve had some good runs on the Manx before, but this place has to be treated with respect. Michael and I are not going to get much chance to test before the rally, so we’re just going to go at our own pace. Once we’re comfortable with the settings we might raise our game a bit.”
The RBS Manx International Rally is based in Douglas and consists of 14 high speed tarmac stages on closed public roads throughout the tiny island. The first car starts from the TT Grandstand at 7pm on Friday evening, and will tackle a selection of tests in the dark. Action resumes at 8:30am on Saturday morning for a full day of action packed rallying.
For more on the rally please visit www.manxrally.org. For more on the championship please visit www.gravelrally.co.uk.