FRIDAY, JANUARY 15, 2010
A DAY OF HEARTBREAK FOR ISUZU DAKAR CONTENDERS
A blown turbo-charger has forced the retirement of the remaining Garland
MotorSports Isuzu D-MAX ute competing in the 2010 Dakar Rally.
Swedish duo Pelle Wallentheim and Olle Ohlsson started the 12th stage of the
event in 51st place after a disappointing day yesterday but had made up
ground to 23rd after 21km of competition.
However around the 40km mark, with absolutely no warning, the turbo blew,
relegating the crew to the side of the track until other competitors had
passed and they could crawl safely to a checkpoint.
³We had been going so well and then this happened,² said Wallentheim,
admitting he was feeling quite empty.
³It was a new turbo. The team changed it on the rest day over the weekend as
part of a planned maintenance schedule for the second part of the event, so
it shouldn¹t have been a problem, but we don¹t know what has caused it.
We¹re just devastated so much hard work for all of us and no result.²
Wallentheim and Ohlsson returned to the 21km checkpoint, which was where the
special stage met the local highway. Several members of the Garland
MotorSports team were there, taking charge of the stricken D-MAX to
transport it through to the overnight camp.
It was heartbreaking news for the crew after a solid year of work,
especially as team boss Bruce Garland and co-driver Harry Suzuki had to
retire from the competition this time last week when a freak accident
smashed their radiator.
³Obviously we¹ll be trying to work out what happened with the turbo,² said
Garland, ³because we¹ve never had a problem like this before.
³A few days back the guys got a lot of dust through the engine. That may
have had something to do with it, but I honestly don¹t know, and won¹t know,
until we¹ve had a chance to strip it down.
³For now, we¹ll just clean up, pack up and head back to Buenos Aires. It¹s
beyond disappointing, given how well we did last year, but this is Dakar and
things happen. It¹s a cruel sport and this is the toughest event of them
all.²
Stage 12 was a massive stage, 790km in total, including the special
(competition) section that was 470km long. Just 59 cars of the 134 that
started the event in Buenos Aires (of a total field of 362) started today.
When it finished, it was the VW Touareg trio at the top of the order: Carlos
Sainz, Nasser Al-Attiyah and Mark Miller. The same trio are leading the
event, with two stages remaining before the official finish in Buenos Aires
on January 17. Of last year¹s podium, (Giniel De Villiers, Miller, Robby
Gordon), defending champion De Villiers (VW) is seventh and Gordon (Hummer)
eighth.
The Garland MotorSports/Tubus Racing teams have contested the 2010 event in
Isuzu D-MAX 4x4 utes, built in Garland¹s Sydney backyard. The standard
3.0-litre turbo-diesel production engine has been slightly tweaked for
better performance, especially for the high altitude sections of the event.
It has maximum torque of 600Nm up 66 per cent on the standard roadgoing
D-MAX ute and peak power of 180kW, which is 50 per cent more than the
standard vehicle. They were competing in Class T1.2, which is modified 4WD
diesel.
In 2009, the Australians finished 11th outright and were first Œamateur¹
(non-factory team) home. They also claimed bragging rights as first diesel
ute and first production chassis car. The Swedes finished 44th outright last
year and, after the retirement of Garland and Suzuki, were trying to repeat
the Australians¹ 2009 results for the Isuzu team.
The Dakar Rally is the world¹s premier off-road endurance competition. First
staged in 1979, it was traditionally run in Europe and Africa, but moved to
South America in 2009 because of safety concerns. The 2008 race the last
to be held in Africa was cancelled on the eve of the start after the
deaths of four French tourists. Their killers had links to the Al Qaeda
terrorist network and threatened Dakar Rally organisers and competitors.
There are regular event updates on the SBS website (www.sbs.com.au/dakar)
every night at 6:00pm AEDT to January 18 and then a one-hour Dakar review
from 11am to 12noon on Sunday, January 24.
Liz Swanton
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2009
Isuzu Motorsports D-Max departs for the DAKAR 2010
SATAURDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2009
The Australian Isuzu Rally Team (Garland Motorsports) Bruce Garland and Harry Suzuki back to the 2010 Dakar (Argentina, Chile) Rally.
“Dakar is the biggest, hardest, toughest, most dangerous race in the world,”
SUNDAY, AUGUST 9, 2009
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Pic credit: Australasian Safari/Offroad Images
GARLAND REGAINS THIRD AS SAFARI ENDS
After a successful appeal against their two-hour penalty, Bruce Garland and Harry Suzuki have taken third outright with their Isuzu D-MAX at the end of the 2009 Australasian Safari.
Garland was handed a two-hour penalty for breaching rules governing the acceptance of outside assistance during the sixth leg of the event. He had stopped to collect two tyres from his service crew. On appeal, the CAMS Stewards reduced that penalty to one hour, moving the Sydneysiders to a podium position.
The Auto section was won by 2008 champions, Stephen Riley and John Doble in their 2008 Mitsubishi Pajero, with Terry and Jodi Conner second in their 1995 Nissan GQ Ute. Both vehicles had V8 petrol engines under their bonnets compared with Garland’s three-litre turbo diesel, which also posted first in class.
Garland and Suzuki are now on their way back to Sydney to continue negotiations with sponsors regarding funding for the 2010 Dakar Rally. They used the Safari as a test session for the Dakar, with plans to improve on the results they posted in the legendary event earlier this year (11th outright and first in class).
“It was a great event but a very tough week,” says Garland.
“We had a few things go wrong. The damage to the fuel tank after we were hit from behind early in the week gave us some problems with fuel delivery, so I don’t think we were as economical as we should be, but I still reckon we probably only used about half the amount of fuel that the guys driving the V8s were using.
“Then we had all the problems with punctures on the sixth day. We had five punctures, slow leaks mainly, when we were running on this track that was very overgrown with lots of little stumps buried in the sand. But I admit we were pushing hard at the time, because we were closing in on second place.”
Garland says he was disappointed by the penalty imposed by stewards after he had stopped to collect extra tyres from his service crew.
“We know the regulations and we knew we would get penalised, but we had asked one of the event officials what we were looking at and they said it would be 30 minutes per tyre. Given how far we were ahead of the guys behind us, we figured it was worth the risk because we obviously needed the tyres to keep going. Then the penalty turned out to be an hour per tyre, and that’s what pushed us right down to sixth place.
“But we appealed and we’re delighted that the stewards have given us back the time and the placing. We didn’t get to stand on the podium, but we still have third place and we’re pleased with that because we had worked hard for it. The competition out there was really tough.”
During the seven-day event which started in the West Australian capital of Perth last week and covered around 3500km of the outback before finishing in the gold mining city of Kalgoorlie yesterday, Garland tested a number of changes in engine, brakes and suspension, all with Dakar in mind.
“We’re pleased with all the changes. They’re definitely the way forward, so we will be setting up the Dakar vehicle in line with what we have discovered. Now all we have to do is get the right sort of budget in place to do Dakar properly. It’s not the sort of event that you go into under-prepared and under-funded, especially if you want to finish in the top 10, which is what our goal is for next year.”
Before these latest improvements, the D-MAX – hand-built in Garland’s Sydney workshop – was putting out around 160kW of power which was an increase of 33 per cent on the standard vehicle, and 500Nm of torque (@2000rpm; up 39 per cent), but Garland says it now has more pulling power and top-end speed.
Auto, motorbike and quad bike competitors tackled the 2009 Australasian Safari which started in Perth and had overnight stops in Geraldton, Mt Magnet, Leonora and Laverton, before finishing in Kalgoorlie.
International entries came from the USA, China, Sweden, South Africa, Japan, New Zealand and the Czech Republic, enhancing the event's reputation as one of the world's toughest, and most respected, motorsport events.
The Garland MotorSports team would like to thank their sponsors for their support during the Safari. They would also like to congratulate and thank the event’s management team and all the volunteers who gave their time to make the 2009 Australasian Safari a memorable event. The Sydney-based team plans to be back next year with the goal of an even better result.
AUTO
1 RILEY / DOBLE Mitsubishi Pajero 26h 22m 24s
2 CONNER / CONNER Nissan GQ Ute +16m 43s
3 GARLAND / SUZUKI Isuzu DMAX +1hr 20m 16s
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June 8, 2009 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
GARLAND THIRD IN CLASS, FIRST DIESEL, AT FINKE RACE
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Bruce Garland and co-driver Harry Suzuki and their Isuzu D-MAX ute (Car 807) have finished as first diesel and third in class (Extreme 4WD) after the 2009 Finke Desert Race.
They finished second yesterday, in the first run down the 226km track between Alice Springs and the tiny Aboriginal settlement of Finke, but today was a rougher, slower run to the finish line.
“We had a puncture today. There was debris from broken buggies all over the track and we snagged the tyre on a piece of metal which lost us a bit of time, and probably cost us the outright second position.
“It was definitely a much slower day. We had a good run yesterday but the track was badly cut up this morning after all yesterday’s traffic and we had some pretty hard landings in some spots.
“Obviously we would have liked to be further up the order, but we’ve learned a lot from the event. Murray Coote’s suspension improvements are terrific and made for a much smoother and more comfortable ride, and the new Bridgestone all-terrain tyres were really good – they gave us plenty of grip – so it all goes into the mix for what lies ahead.”
This year’s Finke Desert Race was step one of Garland and Suzuki’s preparations towards competing in the 2010 Dakar Rally. They were the first diesel ute home in the world’s most famous cross-country rally when it was run in South America in January this year, and finished 11th outright. They’re aiming for a better result next January.
Garland and Suzuki used ‘D-MAX One’ for this weekend’s outback classic; it was the prototype for the Dakar car, and finished fourth in the Condobolin 750 and third outright in the Australasian Safari last year, both test events for the Isuzu’s first run in Dakar. Their next event is this year’s Australasian Safari, which will be run in WA in August.
The Extreme 4WD class which Garland MotorSports contested is for highly modified 4WDs with engines under six litres. Their vehicle, hand-built in Garland’s Sydney workshop, puts out 160kW of power (up 33 per cent on the standard Isuzu D-MAX ute) and 500Nm of torque (@2000rpm, an increase of 39 per cent).
Sponsored by Tattersalls, the Finke race started in 1976 as a ‘there and back’ challenge for local bike riders but soon grew. Cars and buggies (specialist desert racers) were introduced in 1988.
Thousands of spectators camped by the side of the track to watch a huge field of 545 competitors (76 cars and buggies; 468 bikes and quads) head out from Alice Springs but a great number of those failed to finish.
FINAL RESULTS
Outright winner for the cars/buggies: Fellows/Kittle, Jimco 2000 (Pro Buggy)
Outright winner for Extreme 4WD: Bowman/Hardman, Nissan Patrol ute
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For more information:
Liz Swanton on 0417 232 643 // lizswanton@hotkey.net.au