Salonen leads in last leg of rally

Press, 2 July 1985, Page 38

Salonen leads in last leg of rally

By JOHN HAWKINS in Rotorua Timo Salonen of Finland driving a Peugeot will start today’s final leg of the AWA Clarion rally of New Zealand with a Imin 43s advantage over his nearest rival, the West German, Walter Rohrl driving an Audi Quattro. Salonen’s team-mate, Ari Vatanen held third place comfortably 2min 12s behind the leader when the third leg of the rally ended last evening. Last year’s winner, Stig Blomqvist, was in fourth position 3min 51s behind Salonen. In a major upset, the leading New Zealand driver, Neil Allport, rolled his Mazda RX7 out of the rally on stage 34, the penultimate stage yesterday, leaving Malcolm Stewart in fifth position overall with a comfortable advantage as the leading New Zealander ahead of Mataura’s “Inky” Tulloch, who is sixth over all.

Throughout day three of the rally, Salonen continued to build on the 23-second lead he enjoyed over Rohrl when the cars reached “Parc Serme” at the end of the second leg.

When the drivers returned to Rotorua for a lunch break after seven special stages, Salonen had won four and Rohrl’s efforts to retaliate were hampered by gearbox difficulties with his Audi Quattro Sport. Although still setting fast times, Rohrl was pessimistic about his chances of taking back the lead from Salonen, or indeed holding on to second place.

After some confusion as to who was the leading New Zealander at the end of the second leg, Neil Allport took a handy lead on yesterday’s stages run near Rotorua,