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

Targa Tasmania 2007

April 22 - Leg Five
Hobart

"Targa has a habit of cutting short fairytale endings..." Prophetic words it seems, written just a day ago by yours truly. And today, in the last leg of the 2007 'Pure Tasmania' Targa Tasmania, with all three MINI Financial Services MINI Cooper S JCW set to post a giant-killing top-20 finish, that's exactly what happened...Team MINI's tilt at the 2007 Targa Tasmania tripped at (almost) the last hurdle.

With Paul Stokell and Peter Burrey doing the business out in front in the Team Tassie Tiger Cooper, both the writer and fast-charging Grant Denyer touched chicanes -- not hard enough to leave a mark on our animal-skinned Coopers but enough to attract an automatic five-minute penalty each.

Coincidentally, the faux pas happened on the same stage, Roseberry. Amazingly, after almost 2000km of racing, it also happened on the same chicane! MINIs beware!

But it wasn't all bad news. Indeed, there was much still to celebrate for the squad when the big Targa field reached Hobart -- a top ten finish overall, third in class (against the likes of Subaru WRX STIs and Mitsubishi Evo IXs) and the honour of first front-wheel drive home (for the second year running).

Fast man Stokell and co-driver Burrey were the Team MINI stalwarts, running as high as eighth outright on a challenging last day that saw the Strachan stage cancelled and the longest stage of the event, Mt Arrowsmith, held mid-field for over 45min after an accident required emergency vehicles to enter the course.

Tasmanian-born and bred, and an Australian drivers' championship winner, Stokell and 15-time Targa veteran Burrey, brought their Team Tiger MINI home in ninth place -- one place and 20sec ahead of leading rally driver Rick Bates and co-driver Anthony McLoughlin in their Mazda Australia Mazda 3 MPS.

It had been an almost event-long battle between the two teams for top front-wheel drive honours. Though the Mazda had a substantial edge in power, in the end, the Cooper S's overall competence won out.

Though the Roseberry stage's chicane dashed Denyer's hopes of challenging for the top 10, both he and Stokell 'cleared' the stage -- two of only eight vehicles to do so.

On the 47.24km Mt Arrowsmith stage, Stokell posted an amazing sixth fastest overall time -- just 8secs off 'clearing' the stage. Denyer was a scant 7sec slower.

As a result on the chicane penalties, Grant and co-driver Dale Moscatt finished 20th overall and yours truly and left-seater Bill Hayes dropped from near the top 20 to 40th overall.

Paul was understandably pleased with his performance with co-driver Burrey over the whole event.

"I'm truly excited to finish this well," he said. "I thought a top 20 finish would be good, but to be in the top 10 is amazing. I'm so impressed with the car -- it handled well and stopped well all event.

"Today was great. We kept the flow going all day, keeping corner speeds up. To go sixth fastest on Arrowsmith is an achievement, especially as it was damp and the car was moving around. We had to drive on the limit, but it was very enjoyable."

For Grant and yours truly and our respective co-drivers it was a more sombre entry into Hobart. The fact that we continued Team MINI's 100 per cent finishing record was slim consolation for what might have been. But if you do the crime, you do the time.

"I was desperate to make up time lost on Day 2 due to filming commitments for the Grand Final of 'Australia's Got Talent'," said Grant. "Dale and I were going hard and we clipped the chicane. From then on we threw caution to the wind trying to get back into contention.

"TV will take a backseat when Targa comes around next time, I can promise you," Grant said.

The cancellation of the Strahan stage cost also both Denyer and yours truly the opportunity to pull more time back on our respective rivals. The way the Coopers were running and handling and the fact we were on still-fresh Dunlops, we were both looking to post strong times on the flowing 33.24km stage. It was not to be...

In the snakeskin Cooper, however, we still had Mt Arrowsmith to work with and were equally confident we'd pull back significant time on the stage.

Though yours truly and co-driver Hayes 'clicked' early on in the event, I'm confident the penultimate stage of the event was the best we'd performed all week. There's a real joy in getting the teamwork side of a driver/co-driver combination to the next level and I think we made that happen in Arrowsmith.

Indeed, there were sections with progressions of 'six' and 'seven' graded corners where we barely had to lift, let alone brake. We passed our first car, a Porsche GT3, less than 15km into the stage and our run was on song to be significantly faster than my personal pre-event 'target' time when an accident stoppage required our assistance.

The good news was the spill was not serious, but, it also meant our 'derived' time was not necessarily indicative of our pace.

Overall Targa Tasmania 2007 was another impressive result for Team MINI. In an event where many consider just greeting the chequered flag as an achievement to even be in with a chance of putting three almost-standard front-wheel drive hatches into top-20 finishes is enough. To post a top 10 finish is a giant-killing effort.

THE MAIN EVENT
A damp start to the day, stages which held moisture into the afternoon and the cancellation of the second longest stage of the event all meant that Targa Tasmania 2007 played right into the hands of Gosford's Tony Sullens and co-driver Julia Rabbett-Barkley and their all-wheel drive privateer Subaru Impreza WRX.

With a handy 48sec lead going into Day Five, the 2002 winner was able to keep a watching brief on the second-placed pairing of Jim Richards and Barry Oliver in their brand-new rear-wheel drive Porsche 911 GT3RS. At the flag, Richards had trimmed the margin by just two seconds.

Two-time Bathurst winner, Tony Longhurst and co-driver Michael de Vere, in the Subaru Impreza WRX STI Spec C were a further 58 seconds back in third.

Sullens and Barkley took over as the lead modern car on the Weldborough Long stage on Day Two after early leader Allan Simonson (Mitsubishi Evo IX) and second-placed man Jason White (Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera) both crashed out. But it was not until Day Four as the rains fell that they built the buffer that was to carry them home.

The Shannons Classic title went to Melbourne's Rex Broadbent and Michael Goedheer in their 1974 Porsche 911 RS. They beat home the 1977 Porsche 911 RS of New South Wales pair, Bill Pye and Grant Geelan, by 30sec with Steve Coad and Simon Vandenberg's Holden Monaro GTS greeting the flag in third place.

Broadbent and Goedheer's also took out the inaugural outright Classic trophy. Previously they won the Classic Handicap title back in 2002, but that title this year went to Pye and Geelan.

Top 10 drivetravel.com Modern Outright
1 918 Sullens/Barkley Subaru Impreza WRX RA 12:51
2 919 Richards/Oliver Porsche 911 GT3 RS 13:37
3 922 Longhurst/De Vere Subaru Impreza WRX STi C Spec 14:35
4 991 Weeks/Allen Lamborghini Super Leggera 14:52
5 996 Quinn/Wenn Porsche 997 Turbo 15:39
6 913 Close/Close Porsche 911 Turbo 15:45
7 939 Warwick/Murphy Porsche 911 GT3 16:33
8 866 Shaw/Parish Mazda RX7 20:08
9 993 Stokell/Burrey Mini Cooper S JCW 20:16
10 958 Bates/McLoughlin Mazda 3MPS 20:36

Top 10 Shannons Classic Outright
1 577 Broadbent/Goedheer Porsche 911 RS 15:54
2 631 Pye/Geelan Porsche 911 Carrera 3 16:35
3 513 Coad/Vandenberg Holden Monaro GTS 18:43
4 636 O'Keefe/Winton-Monet Holden Torana SLR 5000 19:51
5 574 Tierney/Carra Porsche 911 Carrera RS 20:19
6 718 Morton/McDonald Porsche 944 Turbo 20:21
7 573 Eames/Eames Porsche 911 Carrera 3 21:18
= 8 444 Cattlin/Cattlin Ford Mustang Boss 302 23:20
= 8 555 Taylor/Harper Porsche 911 Carrera 23:20
10 551 Cook/Cooper Porsche 911 Carrera RS 25:52

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 Five

Targa Tasmania - Leg Five (April 2007)