We are back in the game
I know I am not Toyota Gazoo Racing South Africa’s next Dakar prodigy. Just as I know that the World Rally Championship spotters are not coming to check me out at local rallies.
The basic brief for this year has been to get as much mileage as you can out of your Toyota GR Yaris and assist the TGRSA team in gathering vital knowledge that will be used on the cars they are planning to build for next year.
And while Toyota SA have no expectations of me bringing home a championship title, I do feel like I have a job to do, and I don’t want to be the guy that didn’t get it done.
So, after not finishing two rallies in a row, the personal pressure I was putting on myself was starting to mount. I desperately wanted to finish the Algoa National Rally..
Even though I said my plan for this rally was to have some fun. And I did. The Algoa National Rally is known as one of the toughest rallies on the calendar.
Day 1 in Longmore Forest was every bit as daunting as I thought it would be. The roads are fast up there. And the terrain is unforgiving. Longmore is not for sissies.
Day 2 in and around Despatch and Uitenhage turned into a mud bath of note after the rain came in and played havoc with the itinerary.
Add to this I have also learnt, that no matter what, or how talented you think you are, you will have little moments in a rally where without a bit of luck, or good faith, things could end badly.
And make no mistake. I had a few of these moments this past weekend, where I thought despite my best intentions, I was about to prematurely exit a rally once again.
But thankfully this time, we had some of the good stuff go our way and we parked our car safely in parc fermé on Saturday afternoon with two completed rounds under our belts.
For me this was like a win. We were not only back in the game, but we had also scored valuable points in the championship.
