Rossetti is 2008 European Champion
Italian Peugeot driver Luca Rossetti has now won his second title of the season. Having earlier clinched his own national series, three first-day bonus points on the Rallye Antibes Cote d'Azur were enough to earn him the European title. He led the ECR category at the end of the first day but then suffered fuel pump problems on day 2 and retired. Rossetti's title came more easily than expected on account of the absence of his only serious rival Renato Travaglia, who withdrew his entry and excluded himself from the series. Finally the Polish driver Michal Solowow turned out to be Rossetti's nearest challenger. The rally winner was Nicolas Vouilloz, this time at the wheel of an official Peugeot 207 S2000, while his regular Benelux based team prepare for next weekend's Valais Rally, and second was Vouilloz's teammate Stephane Sarrazin making an unusual rally appearance. The rally saw the competition debut of the Proton Satria Neo Super 2000 car driven by Bryan Bouffier, the French driver who is the reigning champion - of Poland. An untraced electronic problem prevented the car from revving higher than 7000 rpm, and the car was withdrawn after the first of the three legs of the rally.








Final classification
1 Vouilloz/Klinger       Peugeot 207 S2000        3h21m10.9s
2 Sarrazin/Renucci       Peugeot 207 S2000        3h21m36.4s
3 Solowow/Barran         Peugeot 207 S2000        3h25m32.0s
4 Isik/Ozsenler          Fiat Grande Punto S2000  3h28m02.1s
5 Bruyneel/Descamps      Subaru Impreza N14       3h38m01.6s
6 Fontana/Cassina        Peugeot 207 S2000        3h38m47.0s
7 Tlustak/Skaloud        Citroen C2 S1600         3h39m01.9s
8 Fabre/Cavavero         Renault Clio S1600       3h41m31.2s

European Championship points: Luca Rossetti (I)67p, Michal Solowow (PL) 65p, Volkan Isik (TR) 54p, Corrado Fontana (I) 34p, Krum Fonchev (BG) 30p, Luca Betti (I) 29p etc.

Third Win for Nasser
Nasser Al Attiyah, devastatingly unsuccessful in this year's world rally championship Production Car series, is pulling away in the Middle East series after his third regional victory of the season. He inherited the lead of the Jordan Rally on the second day after a remarkable run by Lebanon driver Roger Feghali, well respected as an asphalt driver but with little previous experience driving on gravel. When handsomely leading, Feghali's Mitsubishi stopped on stage 11 with fuel pump failure and retired. Using the same stage roads as on the country's world championship rally earlier in the year, Feghali benefited from a good starting order position on day 1, but Al Attiyah still held second place despite running first. Al Attiyah now holds a 13 points lead with just two events to run. Second place overall on the rally, and also in the FIA's MERC tables, is one of the three Under-27 drivers eligible for the Pirelli Star Driver award.. This is Nick Georgiou. Of the three drivers, Yazeed Al Rajhi crashed on the second stage, but earlier still the third driver Nicos Thomas was in trouble. Scrutineers had him excluded him from using his entered Mitsubishi, which was discovered to be an earlier model Lancer modified up to the latest Evo IX specification. Yazeed sportingly lent him his spare Subaru Impreza N12 to start the event, but the car gave troubles and Thomas struggled even to finish. Georgiou and Thomas are now alone in being eligible to win the MERC Star Driver prize at the end of the year.


Jordan Rally MERC 2008
1. Al-Attiyah /Patterson   Subaru Impreza N14             3h 05m02.5s
2. Georgiou/Matar          Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution 9  3h 11m 02.9s
3. Al-Najjar/Fanous        Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution 9  3h 11m 23.4s
4. Al-Shanfari/ Barritt    Subaru Impreza N14             3h 14m 53.7s
5. Saleh/Chehab            Subaru Impreza N14             3h 16m 42.3s
6. Bustami/ Mansour        Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution 8  3h 22m 08.4s

2008 FIA Middle East Rally Championship - positions after round 5/7: Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah (QA) 38 pts; Nick Georgiou (RL) 25 pts ; Misfer Al-Marri (QA) 22 pts; Nizar Al-Shanfari (OM) 21 pts; Michel Saleh (RL) 16 pts; Nicos Thomas (CY) 16 pts

International Championship Rallying Returns to Scotland
A newly formed and as yet unnamed event is to bring international championship rallying back to Scotland next year. Invited to be the final round of the 2009 IRC (Intercontinental Rally Challenge) series, few details of the event have been announced beyond the decision to run gravel surfaced special stages in Stirling, Perth and Kinross in central Scotland. Currently the only major rally hosted in Scotland is the Jim Clark Memorial Rally, a qualifying round of the British rally series run on asphalt stages. It is believed that the new event will replace the Rally of China in the IRC, an event which on account of logistic costs has been generally boycotted by regular IRC competitors, for whom there are no compulsory entry rules in championship regulations. The last time the British world championship event visited Scotland was in 1996 but this year there was a major one-off one-day event in central Scotland when famous old timer rally drivers took part on the Colin McRae Stages. The full calendar for IRC qualifying events in 2009 is expected to be announced after the Rallye du Valais (Oct 24-25).

3mmm
photo 1: Peugeot - Rossetti
photo 2: Proton Satria Super 2000
photo 3: Subaru - Al Attiyah
photo 4: Thomas and Georgiou