Wyn Humphreys had to concede the lead in the 2007 Tesco 99 Octane British Rally Championship on the Ulster International Rally last weekend, after gearbox woes seriously compromised his challenge.
Humphreys went into the event, the fourth round in the series, eager to maintain the consistency that had put him top in the standings however, it all went wrong for the BRC newcomer right from the word go.
“On the first fast section of the first stage the car started jumping out of 5th gear,” explained the Stobart TEG Sport driver.
“The roads are so tricky over there that you need two hands on the wheel so I couldn't hold it gear. The next time I tried to select fifth the box started crunching and it wouldn't go in. We had no choice but to drive with four gears and get the car back to service.”
Worse was to come though for the former Welsh national rally champion, when he learned he wouldn't be able to change the ‘box, as a replacement was just too expensive. Furthermore while the team did have a replacement, that was only a standard gearbox.
“On the way into [the final] service [on Friday] Ally [Mackay – my co-driver] and I started to take parts off the car in preparation for the change but when we got there my dad told me that it may cost up to £3500 to borrow the box,” Wyn added.
“This left us with three options – use the standard box, use the Prodrive box which may have meant we wouldn't have enough money to do the next rally or stick with the damaged box in the car!
“Unfortunately for us the only real option was to stick with what we had as the stages are so technical over here, a four speed dog box would still be better than a standard one!”
