Watersport in Murwillumbah
With less then 100 days to the start of Repco Rally Australia, that country’s first East Coast world championship rally, came pictures of the planned downtown superspecial stage outside the event’s headquarters office, at Murwillumbah. Deep in water! Rally officials were commenting on the consequences of northern NSW and south Queensland’s recently catastrophic rainfalls, stating that it is too early to know to what extent the rains had damaged the forest stages. Already the national championship Coffs Harbour Rally, due to be run some 250km south of Rally Australia territory on the final weekend in June, has been postponed till the end of th e year. Meanwhile New South Wales’s Minister for State Development has announced "appropriate special legislation" to "ensure the event can happen in September".

Ostberg’s Codriver Merry-go-round
Jonas Andersson, usual Swedish codriver for PG (no relation) Andersson is to be the latest codriver for 21 year old Norwegian world championship driver Mads Ostberg. After a trial run at the Aurskog Holand Rally on June 6 they go together to the Acropolis Rally. Only broken steering 1.5 km before the end of stage 12, the last stage on day 2, stopped Mads from achieving a remarkable and career best fourth place on the Rally d’Italia, with his f iancee Veronica as codriver. A mandatory ten minute penalty dropped him to seventh overall at the finish. After years working together with Ole Kristian Unnerud, why does Mads need yet another codriver change? "I prefer Veronica is my fiancee not my codriver!", said Mads. Potential father-in-law Morten Ostberg, proprietor of the Adapt Rally Team added. "we are happy to be in this family situation. It was very inspiring for all of us to have (Veronica) in this role in Sardinia, but due to their relationship we all regard this as not such a good idea". Andersson currently works as a construction manager in Norway and in 2004 he was codriver to PG when they won the World Junior Championship and then won the World Junior Cup again in 2007.

Gronholm’s Race to the Clouds
25 years after rallycross star Martin Schanche took his experimental four-wheel drive rallycross Ford Focus to the Pikes Peak international Hill Climb in Colorado state, USA, twice world rally champion Marcus Gronholm heads off to tackle the event in a special five door version of the Fiesta rallycross car. Promotion for this project comes on the back of the impending launch of the Fiesta production car on the American market. Times have moved on in recent years for the "Race to the Clouds", which climbs from 2800 to 4200 metres above sea level. Race Director Phil Layton explained: "by the time of the 2009 event (19 July) seven 20miles of the 12.42 mile course will now be tarmac. The paving process started in 2001, designed to protect specially identified areas which needed erosion control. The asphalt stretches are not continuous. This means that the challenge for competitors has altered. Drivers are now continuously changing from asphalt to dirt surfaces". After an impressive start to his regulatory one-shot climb in 1984, Schanche’s attempt was thwarted by a puncture. Course record stands at 10m01.41s by Nobihiro Tajima in a Suzuki XL-7 special in 2007.

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