BRC
Isle of Man: Matt Beebe summary
Beebe flies into championship lead Defending R3 British Rally Champion Matt Beebe put in a sterling effort on last weekends Rally Isle of Man, the third round of the 2007 Tesco 99 Octane MSA British Rally Championship to move into the lead of ...
Published: Jul 24, 2007, 4:38 AM
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Beebe flies into championship lead
Defending R3 British Rally Champion Matt Beebe put in a sterling effort on last weekends Rally Isle of Man, the third round of the 2007 Tesco 99 Octane MSA British Rally Championship to move into the lead of his class as the season reaches its half way mark.
Nuneaton based Matt was co-driven by Richard Mills for this event and at the end of the three day marathon Richard, who last co-drove for Matt during his successful 2005 stars of the future campaign, commented this is the biggest and fastest rally I have ever done. Matt has come along so much since our last event together!
The rally very nearly had a premature end when Matt missed a gear and over revved the engine on only the second stage of the rally. With bent exhaust valves in the engine the pair briefly considered retiring but eventually decided to carry on and try and scavenge some championship points. As it was the pair ended the opening leg third in class and 34th overall.
A hard push on Friday, the longest day of the event, saw the m3motorsport run MG trading times with rising Swedish star Andreas Sjolander. By lunchtime the two were separated by less than 5 seconds and were rapidly leaving their rivals gasping for breath. The giant killing charge became a rather noisy affair in the afternoon when the exhaust manifold worked itself loose, robbing Matt of even more power, but despite that he still kept Andreas in his sights.
Brake problems hampered the pair on Saturday, preventing them from pushing the rapid Swede ahead of them, and then, when a driveshaft came loose the pair decided to settle for second place points, and more amazingly 8th overall in the British Rally Championship!
What a great weekend. I thought our rally was over on Thursday but we decided to push on and to come away from the Isle of Man with eighth overall, and ahead of no less than three Super 1600s' is amazing! We now lead the championship heading to Ulster, so its game on! A big thanks to Eastern Airways for allowing me to fly over to the island in luxury and also to Richard, my co-driver. The notes were perfect! M3 worked wonders on the car and the guys from the college were brilliant.
Matt, who is assisted by North Warwickshire and Hinckley College, will now focus on the Ulster Rally which begins on 1st September. Last year Matt had a rather close call with one of the islands rather unforgiving stone walls and will be eager to make amends this time around.
-credit: www.mattbeebe.co.uk
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