Yanagisawa completed eventful rally effecting by tropic squall, and gaining meaningful 2nd!
| Yanagisawa completed eventful effecting by tropic squall, and gaining meaningful 2nd! |
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| The sixth round of FIA Asia-Pacific Rally Championship(APRC), “Malaysian Rally” was taken place from 11-12 October at around Johor Bahru, very close to border between Singapore. |
 After sunset and releasing from daytime hot, the event kicked of by ceremonial start |
CUSCO RACING which skipped round 5 in Indonesia after Rally Hokkaido in Japan(APRC registers can nominate six events from total seven events of the series) entered two cars for this round 6; Hiroshi Yanagisawa was on battle for both main series of APRC and Asia cup(subsidiary series). Yuya Sumiyama who came to Malaysia first time for competing got earlier arrival to accustom him to hot and humidity Malaysian condition. For Yanagisawa, it’s third time to compete in Malaysia, however he experienced bitter taste last year with off the road on only SS1. He aimed to make revenge of last year and also looking at the battle of Asia cup. On battle for APRC, now only Cody Crocker and Katsu Taguchi have chance to gain the title. However Crocker can earn point on this rally and also final round in China, but for Taguchi, this event is last chance to scoring which should boost the 1999 APRC champion. Their battle may effect whole rally much, so many eyes were giving attention them. | |
 Discussion with engineer after no seconds to refresh distress from heat. Even shakedown, they have so many things to do. |
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The stages of Malaysian are well known as running through palm-oil plantations. Its smooth gravel road is extremely slippery and there are number of trap such as concrete blocks. There is not much ballast on road surface, so early runner should have no disadvantage to sweep those gravel, even it would be advantage. |
 Yuya completed first stage consistently and got rhythm at his first rally in here Malaysia |
 The heavy rain starting from SS5 changed road condition to full wet on SS7. Yanagi even struggle to approach on jumping point. |
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 Warping body doesn’t arrowed to fit any parts properly. Experienced mechanics gave their best effort to fix the machine in limited time slot. |
This time Yanagisawa was given car No.4 and No.9 for Sumiyama. After Sumiyama, multiple P-WRC champ Toshi Arai who entered this event occasionally followed. The day 1 was consisted total 8SS; 4 stages were split by service halt and repeated those section. The day 2 was also repeating section of three stages which was split by day time service and was consisted by total 6 SS. The total competition distance was 226.74km for total 14 SS. |
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 Yanagi , on 20km from opening stage. The condition on the start was completely dry with beautiful sunshine. |
 SS3 showed worst condition in whole of the event. However the condition kept dry on day 1 only until after one stage of here. |
 SS6 sawed worth rain. Yuya drove with caring machine which damaged previous stage. |
 First stage of day 2. Sky was clear but road surface was still some damp due to from previous rain |
 Yanagi run SS12. Malaysian stages run through oil palm plantation. |
 SS14. Yanagi kept conservative driving under difficult situation which hard to maintain the motivation by heat and huge gap. |
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The rally was kicked off by ceremonial start on Friday night 10 October, following actual competition start on 11th morning. Yanagisawa got permission to make maximum push, however from bad experience from last year when crashed out on SS1, he was cautious on for opening stage. In result of the conservative approach, he lost 35 seconds on 29km stage. Meanwhile, Sumiyama who had been facing consecutive retirement on New Zealand and Hokkaido aimed absolutely complete the event. Additionally the challenge to one of most difficult rally of APRC, he also made cautious approach for first loop. But real enemy was neither the heat nor slippery road. On SS5 which started from 1400hrs, suddenly heavy rain was started. The tropic squall was really “turning bucket with full of water over” which took from drivers away proper visibility. Only first two drivers, Crocker and Taguchi complete the stage before getting wet. Even Yanagisawa faced the rain toward to end of the stage and lost some seconds. Sumiyama was even worth as hitting car to concrete barrier due to bad visibility. After the squall, the road condition changed suddenly from completely dry to full wet. Majority of drivers were victim of the rain and withdraw from day 1 including championship leader Taguchi or Arai who should have more experience to driving Malaysian stages. Eventually Yanagisawa stood second overall at end of day 1. Moreover the gap between the leader was 2 minutes, between the third was over 4 minutes which meant the battle was almost decided at the point. Meanwhile Sumiyama who got machine damage from the incident on SS5 completed SS6 and brought his car back to service. Team’s mechanic made best effort to repair the car. However the damage was too extensive and unable to complete the repair perfectly. Sumiyama had to attack rest of the stages of the day with still damaged car, and forced to stop on SS7 finally. After deciding withdraw from day 1, Sumiyama wished to restart day 2 to learn more those tough condition of the stages, but unfortunately recovery car was not able to reach his machine to pick up due to bad weather and also too many retires. Under regulation of Super rally, team have to bring prepared machine at latest 6 hours in prior to start of day2, but the situation arrowed to rescue his machine only the morning of day2. At the point, practically Sumiyama had to retire from the event on the SS7. Yanagisawa started day2 from second overall with huge gap. Having tactics for battle of Asia cup on next round in China to attack maximumly, He made wide decision to maintain current machine condition by conservative drive without any risk. From this sensible approach, Yanagisawa finished the event in meaningful second overall. Now he can make 100% attack on the battle in China without any maneuver. Due to retirement of Taguchi, Crocker who won the event secured this year’s APRC title mathematically which will be his third title in a row. He only needs to start final round in China to confirm the title. For Asia cup, Yanagisawa arrowed one point behind of Crocker. Under the situation of the standings, the battle for the title is now clear as winner of next round is going to be wins the title. |
 Wet condition gave even slippery road worth situation. |
 Yanagi completed patient driving and gained meaningful second overall. He is going to face tough battle for Asia cup on next round. |
 Many spectators welcomed Yanagi who completed equatorial heat in Malaysian stages |
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