Day 3 Cobar to Broken Hill

The surprise of the day is we are in the lead again by about 1 minute. We started the day in second

place but the 3rd stage of the day saw the Belgian Porsche stuck in a bog hole.

The Porsche is driven by Joost Van Cauwenberge, a Belgian who we became friends with in the London to Cape Town rally. Their car was built by Francis Tuttle who is a world renowned car builder and he is here to support them. Joost is very quick.

Joost in action, (photo from the Classic Outback Trail website)

Joost had started 3rd on the road today but at the start of SS10, the Callinans (BDG Escort) 1st on the road and Trevor Stilling (Datsun Stanza) 2rd on the road, organised him to be first on the road as it was a 57 Km section and even with 3 minute gaps he was going to catch and have to pass them. We were 4th on the road.

The first car we came to was the Stanza stopped in the stage (not sure why) then towards the end as we approached a fast right hander, there was the Porsche and the Escort thoroughly bogged. They pointed to take an inside line which we did and got through. So we are in the lead thanks to them really.
Geoff Olholm is now in 2nd spot. Geoff is no slouch either. He won the Australian Safari last year. Being in the lead on day 3 was never part of our plan. The stages now are getting longer and this really is early in the rally, anything could happen!!

                           Waiting for the start of Special Stage 10 near Broken Hill

The stages for the last two days have been tracks on station properties. The second stage of today was so rain affected that it was cancelled. Good fast road can turn into a skid pan quite quickly. The track is sometime very indistinct and the organisers have put in arrows at the worst spots. At one stage we headed in the direction of an arrow and Marks comment was “but there’s no road here!”.


The other laugh of the day – at the start of SS10 after putting on helmets Mark couldn’t find his glasses. In panic we looked on the roof, everywhere in the car, ran around the car, before finding them – he was wearing them all the time.