Gaurav Gill and Australian based co-driver Glenn Macneall clean swept today’s six special stages concluding the 2014 VINZ International Rally of Whangarei - snatching victory from overnight leader and team mate Jan Kopecký.
The opening round of the 2014 FIA Asia Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) saw competitors head south for today’s six remaining special stages – to roads more familiar to Gill, driver of the MRF Tyres ŠKODA Fabia S2000 car.
Starting behind Kopecký for the day of double run stages, Gill was in a closely fought battle for stage honours, until the 32-year-old found advantage on the 27.43km Springfield test. Pulling out a time 25 seconds faster than his rival was all Gill needed to put his MRF Tyres team mate behind him for the run to the finish. Defending the gain second time round, Gill added a further 1.1 seconds to win by a competitive 11.9 seconds after 220.87km of competition.
Gill, a three-time national rally champion won his maiden APRC title last year with the highly rated Finnish rally champion Esappeka Lappi as his teammate. Prior to that he had partnered current Hyundai World Rally Championship (WRC) and former Subaru factory rally driver Chris Atkinson in 2012, which was his first season driving S2000-specification rally cars.
The Delhi resident has been adamant in his desire to return to competing on the WRC stage, where he drove in the Production WRC (PWRC) category in 2008 and 2009, becoming the first Indian rally driver to score a point in the PWRC.
Gill came painfully close to winning the APRC title in 2010 but fell three points short after crashing out in the season closing round at China. He first started competing in select rounds of the APRC in 2007 and 2008, with his first full season starting a year later.
| Pos | Car | Driver/Co-Driver/Country/ | Time |
| 1 | 1 | Gaurav Gill/Glenn Macneall (IND) Skoda Fabia S2000 | 2hr11m39.7s |
| 2 | 2 | Jan Kopecky/Pavel Dresler (CZE) Skoda Fabia S2000 | +11.9s |
| 3 | 3 | Mark Pedder/Claire Dowling (AUS) Mitsubishi Lancer EVO X | +8m22.6 |
| 4 | 5 | Tom Wilde/Bill Hayes (AUS) Renault Clio CAMS G2 | +12m38.8 |
| 5 | 4 | Jun Xu/Sheng Liu (CHN) Skoda Fabia S-2000-R | +12m54.6 |
| 6 | 6 | Michael Young/Erin Kelly (NZL) Proton Satria Neo | +17m53.6 |
| 7 | 7 | Sanjay Takale/Sean Gregory (IND) Subaru Impreza | +22m20.3 |
| 8 | 9 | Takumi Masukawa/Yuya Yamagishi (JPN) Mazda Demio (RJ) | +26m14.1 |
2014 APRC – driver points after first round (provisional).
1 Gaurav Gill (IND) 38
2 Jan Kopecky (CZE) 31
3 Mark Pedder (AUS) 25
4 Tom Wilde (AUS) 19
5 Jun Xu (CHN) 17
6 Michael Young (NZL) 12
7 Sanjay Takale (IND) 8
Write your Comment