Wow, what an experience this car was. I likened it to riding the bull at a rodeo, you hang on for grim death, enjoy the ride, and hope (wait) for it to throw you off.
What a ride and what a ton of fun.
I think that with some practice, I could really get to love this Escort.
Was taking things as safely as I could, trying to get a feel for the car and stay out of trouble. After 3 Stages I was only a few seconds behind Rick, and half way around Mineshaft II, I thought "what the hell, give it some humpty and see what happens" :wink:.
It was going great, even started pulling a reasonable gap to Rick and had him sweating.
Sadly, on the last Stage, I threw it all away.
Going around the opening right hander, I put a wheel on the inside grass, and for some reason, it rolled badly into the bush. After a CFH, the car must have been badly damaged somehow, it seemed to have a badly slipping clutch, and just kept revving and dying. So I drove the whole last stage at snails pace, even though I had my foot hard to the floor. Somehow it made it to the end but I had dropped about 1.15 min. Oops!!
Grats to Rick for the Oceania win, but at least I had him a tad worried for a while.
Thanks to Damien and Rick for the TS chatting.
We'll definitely have to run this car again, the fun factor is great
once you get used to it.