Maiden event for new team, positive response while event was full of drama
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| FIA Asia-Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) opened its 2011 season at again “Malaysian Rally” (also opening round of 2011 Asia Cup and Junior Cup from 1-3 April, based on Johor Bahru). As attending the series many years as Cusco Racing, the team however reached to big turning point with extending the form. To aiming APRC title and Asia cup, team welcomed new sponsor, Indonesian oil company “Pertamina” and have got new team name “Pertamina Cusco Racing”. Indonesian Rifat Sungkar registers both APRC and Asia cup along side reigning Asia cup champion Yuya Sumiyama who back to defend his title for new season. Both drivers will drive Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X for third season. Also Carrosser, parent company of Cusco, launched all-new project with Proton Satria Neo. The compact model from Malaysian company has exactly the spec of 1.6 little NA engine with 2WD, the category which Japanese market is missing currently. Carrosser recently had announced to import and distribute this car as base model for competition machine with developing competition parts as well. To promote the potential of the car, the company decided to make challenge for the title of inaugural APRC Junior cup which the spec of Satria Neo is eligible. For this activity, Proton Cusco Rally Team is established and welcomed Japanese young driver Akira Bamba who made two time class win when he competed selected APRC rounds in Suzuki Swift Sport with Cusco Racing. Also the team supports customer driver Kosuke Takashino which is another challenge for team in team management aspect. As Malaysian Rally is home event for Proton, Satria Neo Group N machine with Cusco sign gained huge amount of attention. Also after huge disaster of big earthquake and Tsunami which struck Japan in 11 March, many local people gave encouraging message. All of Japanese crew started the event with message sticker on machine to cheering people in Japan and to appreciate all countries in global supported Japan. All their thought was with Japan and prayed for their hope. This year’s edition of Malaysian Rally set spectator friendly Super SS first time to adjacent service park in shopping complex in outskirt of Johor Bahru. The first run of the stage was held after ceremonial start in 1 April. On the first stage of the event, and also new season, Sungkar and Sumiyama set identical time and lead the event which gave team promising start. Proper rally competition was started from following day. The route for the Day1 was consisted with two loops of three stages following second run of Super SS. Day 2 also had similar layout with two loops of three stages and rally was closed by third and final run of Super SS. The route in Malaysian event is traced roads in plantation flexibly and slightly different each year. This year, even some area had big felling work from last year which gave drivers completely different feeling. Adding on typical Malaysian weather of hot and humidity, daily squall which changed the condition suddenly is major concern for the event usually and hinted that the event is one of toughest challenge of the series which bring many dramas every year. And exactly the misfortune befell to Pertamina Cusco Racing. The overnight rain left some wet patch on the course and Sumiyama lost his proper rhythm over the changeable condition. He left the stage on SS4 and was unable to back to the course. On this stage, Sungkar also faced unlucky trouble when his Lancer Evolution X has overheating issue which caused bad fuel consumption. The fuel for his machine ran out just 2km before the Service Park. As Sungkar didn’t any change of the setting on his machine as the setting formerly Hiroshi Yanagisawa made was quite suit to Sungkar as well. However, it seems that there were some different on driving style of the two drivers which may affected on some area unexpectedly. Still, Sungkar set third fastest time on SS3 and fourth fastest on SS4 which offered Sungkar to be happy with machine itself and said “To be honest, the machine is awesome! It was 3 seconds per km faster than my machine last year.” To prove his words, Sungkar marked three of fastest time in a row on first section on Day 2 after he restarted. It could say that Cusco built machine brought Sungkar’s real potential and in fact, Sungkar finished in first place on individual result for Day 2 and gained 3 bonus points. Meanwhile Sumiyama hit palm tree on SS10 which left big task for next round of Asia cup in end of September. In other hand, for Proton Cusco Rally Team, Bamba showed sensible driving on difficult rally in his first visiting and continued trouble-free run. Driving N2 formula, but showing quite close battle with more powered N4 machine, Bamba made perfect win among Junior Cup. He even gained points on APRC and Asia cup as finished in 7th and 5th respectively. The next round of APRC (also first round of Pacific cup and second round of Junior cup), Rally Queensland (Australia) will be held from 13-15 May. Rifat Sungkar (APRC and Pacific Cup), Akira Bamba (APRC and Junior cup) and Kosuke Takashino(Junior cup) will be attending the event. Yuya Sumiyama “It was my third outing to the Malaysian event, but I was confused as I got different feeling from last year on even exactly same section, so I couldn’t find to rhythm well for those stages. I think my driving style got something different as I gained many experience now and also my machine had been improved a lot on this third season. So now I feel that we need to amend our approach in many aspects. It kind of task to climb to another step, and we have plenty of time to next round in Hokkaido, so I and my co-driver will talk and try to find suitable way.” Akira Bamba “It was my first visiting to rally in Malaysia, and I like those roads quite much. Many thank to no squall anyway! The machine showed plenty of performance on the first competition. Suspension is good and body rigidity is also good enough, so I’m really impressive with the potential of the car. Still we have many areas to do as many of parts are still standard and under developing, so I’m sure there are still a lot to come. I learnt in China last year, so I tried to save enough at where need to do. And… yes I need to speak in English smoothly at media conference as I was so nervous at the tense situation. I guess I need more experience for that!” |
