Targa Tasmania - Leg Four – Car Reviews, News & Advice

With all three JCW Coopers placed higher than at any time during last year's event, Team MINI is set for a record-breaking finish in the 2007 'Pure Tasmania' Targa Tasmania.

Indeed, as Day Four of the country's best known and longest tarmac rally drew to a close in the northwest Tassie 'capital' of Burnie, two of Team MINI's crews were in the top 20, while the Carsales Network supported entry of the writer and Bill Hayes was in 25th and charging.

Leading the MINI pack after more than 1400km is Paul Stokell and Peter in the Team Tiger car. They are placed 11th overall at the close of Day Four, just three seconds outside the top ten after 35 competitive stages. Paul's MINI was in and out of the top ten through a day of dramatically changing conditions.

Grant Denyer and Dale Moscatt in the Team Cheetah picked up their pace during the day to finish 14th overall, 39sec away from a top ten spot.

Today's 471km Leg Four started in Hobart and included 106km of competitive sections across eight stages. In changeable conditions, the Targa course was both lashed by rain and bathed in sunshine during the day.

Pressing on through the field and making road position when we could, Team Snake experienced its share of Tassie's weather contrasts.

Streaming wet roads greeted us on the last stage of the day -- Ferndale -- and though cool heads prevailed, (along with the other Team MINI crews) we still made time on much of the field.

Earlier, the weather gods favoured Hayes and yours truly and we were able to post our first top ten stage time of the event. With rain hitting the snakeskin Cooper only in the later kilometres of the 22km South Riana stage, our posted time had us among the fastest of the fast... You take the good ones, when you get them.

Today was the time Team Tiger chose to step up the pace. All the Team MINI cars operating on a different tyre strategy and thus it was time for Paul and Peter to move their medium compound tyres to the front of the car and start to push some of the 'faster' cars.

Over the 37.48km Cethana Paul posted 13th fastest time -- three places ahead of Grant. The tables were turned on Gunns Plains when Denyer (on mediums all round) was eighth fastest overall and Stokell overshot a corner costing himself around 15 seconds.

"We haven't been trying that hard so our results are really solid. There's still plenty more in the tank for tomorrow," Paul reckons.

With still-fresh Dunlops, Denyer's confident too about the make or break Day Five.

"I was really in the groove today, working well with Dale off the pace notes, not what I could see. You don't get that on Day One. Tomorrow we're going to surprise a lot of the exotics -- maybe not necessarily up the hill at Queenstown but on the Mt Arrowsmith and Strachan stages look out.

"We're still rebounding from the day I missed shooting 'Australia's Got Talent' on Thursday, but we're carving through the field.

"Cethana stage was mind blowing. We were passing cars at 220 km/h in Cethana stage; up on two wheels; getting airborne; the whole bag of tricks. We did get baulked by a couple of cars who didn't see us or wouldn't move over, which was frustrating."

The Cethana stage claimed the only man likely to outshine Denyer in the celebrity stakes at Targa, Eric Bana.

Bana's immaculate Ford XB GT coupe got up close and personal with the scenery on the stage and was too badly damaged to continue. Both Eric and co-driver, friend and the car's builder Tony Ramunno were unhurt.

The star of the small and big screen may have to plan a different ending to his motor racing documentary -- Targa has a habit of cutting short fairytale endings.

For myself, I couldn't be happier. Cethana ranks as my favourite stage of the event and this year with Mr Hayes was over a minute faster than 2006 -- just 2sec off the fastest Team MINI time last year. We're also 34 places ahead of where we were in 2006.

Bill's ARC, WRC and Targa experience adds more pace than a 50kW power injection! But though we're on target for our top 30 finish, there's still a long way to go...

THE MAIN EVENT
With one day remaining, the battle for overall drivetravel.com Modern category honours is still close.

Leader since Day Two, 2004 champion Tony Sullens and co-driver Julia Rabbett-Barkley have taken advantage of the damp conditions and driven their unsponsored Kumho-shod Subaru Impreza WRX RA to a 48sec gap -- their widest margin yet.

Still second is Jim Richards and Barry Oliver in their OAMPS Porsche 911 GT3 RS. Jim will no doubt be praying for sun tomorrow -- if he's to gain time back on Sullens/Barkley in his two-wheel drive Porsche, the roads will need to be dry.

The Gallardo Superleggera of Kevin Weeks and John Allen is in third place, a further 29sec behind. After a steady event, the Lambo pairing lost around 45sec on the day's penultimate stage after a minor off.

Yesterday's big movers, Tony Longhurst and Michael de Vere, were the big losers across today's afternoon stages as tyre wear on their Subaru Impreza WRX STI Spec C became an issue -- particularly in the wet.

In the Shannons Classic competition, Rex Broadbent and Michael Goedheer (1974 Porsche 911 RS), stretched their overnight lead from Bill Pye and Grant Geelan also in a 911. Steve Coad and Simon Vandenberg have also cemented their third placing in the world's fastest HQ Monaro GTS.

Top 5 -- drivetravel.com Modern competition - end day 4 of 5
1 Tony Sullens
2 Jim Richards +48 secs
3 Kevin Weeks +1 min:17 secs
4 Tony Longhurst, +1 min 21 secs
5 Tony Quinn, +1:53 secs

Top 5 -- Shannons Classic competition -- end day 4 of 5
1 Rex Broadbent
2 Bill Pye, +1 min 09 secs
3 Steve Coad, +2 min 40 secs
4 Peter O'Keefe, +3 min 28 secs
5 Gary Tierney, +4 min 13 secs

Team MINI placings -- end day 4 of 5
Car 993 Stokell/Burrey 11th overall
Car 992 Denyer/Moscatt 14th overall
Car 988 Sinclair/Hayes 25th overall

Images by Perfect Prints

Full results and more photos at targatasmania.com.au

Follow the link to Team MINI's news and results from the 2006 Targa Tasmania event here

Targa Tasmania - Leg Four

Targa Tasmania - Leg Four (April 2007)