2014 Asia-Pacific Rally Championship held in Longyou

2014 Asia-Pacific Rally Championship held in Longyou, east China’s Zhejiang province, on Nov. 7, 2014.

The day after the spectacular start ceremony, a SS1, a 2 kilometre special stage in front of thousands of spectators, China Rally was full of drama from the first stage.

Steady overnight rain turned the gravel stages into super slippery mud tracks as Mike Young found out in the first 500 metres of stage 2. The New Zealander slid of the road in his two-wheel drive Proton and needed help from spectators to get going again, losing just over one minute in the process.

This year’s Asia-Pacific Rally Champion Jan Kopecký from the Czech Republic stayed out of trouble, winning the stage and improving his lead on Gill to 18 seconds.

Relatively untroubled, Kopecký won all the remaining stages of the day in his Team MRF Skoda Fabia S2000, while just behind Japan’s Yuya Sumiyama sits just behind him in second 2nd overall and leads the Asia Cup. In the atrocious weather both Kopecký and Sumiyama can be commended, driving exceptionally well in trying conditions and bringing their cars back to evening service extremely dirty but undamaged.

“It’s very tricky because it’s raining all the time, there’s a lot of mud everywhere, you need to follow the ruts in the mountain stage (SS2/5), some hidden rocks and we hit the same one as Gaurav but for its OK. Tomorrow its again difficult but hopefully our (pace) notes are fine and we can bring the car to the finish. Hopefully Gaurav can restart tomorrow, everyone likes his driving style as he’s quite aggressive”, said Jan Kopecký at evening service. Sumiyama had similar coments, “Very rough conditions, ditches and many many rocks, Good position must keep!”.

After his earlier scare, Young is third overall and with Pedders retirement, he adds the 2014 Production Cup to his already impressive title tally for this season.

EZY Racing’s Dinesh Deheragoda from Sri Lanka found the conditions very difficult, especially when his Mitsubishi windscreen fogged up, for most of the mountain stage San Men Yuan. Despite the challenges, Deheragoda is pleased to be second in Asia Cup and fourth overall.

The Rally came to an end on 10th,and Kopecky won the title while Yuya Sumiyama got the Asia Cup.