by Geoff Mayes
David Meredith enjoyed a return to form on the Rally Isle of Man last weekend when the former ‘Stars of the Future' rally champion put in a competitive drive on the three-day long event, eventually finishing inside the top ten overall.
The Welshman, who is co-driven by fellow countryman Dai Roberts in his Revolution Wheels-backed Mitsubishi Evo 9, had recently struggled to keep up with the pace of his fellow British Rally Championship competitors. But following a recent test and the decision to move from 17 to 18 inch tyres the young farmer was happy with his weekend's performance.
The Rally Isle of Man was run over three days and featured a variety of different weather conditions, making tyre choice really difficult. Despite this Meredith ran on the fringes of the top ten throughout the event and once the weather dried up on Saturday he was able to push harder, eventually finishing the 160 mile long rally ninth overall and eighth amongst the BRC competitors.
“The Isle of Man has always been a fairly difficult rally for me but I'm very pleased with my weekend,” he noted.
“We made the move to 18 inch tyres on Friday and although I need to do a lot more work to the setup of the car now I was very happy with the improvement in performance.
“The weather conditions were really tricky and we had a small ‘off' on Saturday when we slid into a hedge, but apart from that I had a great rally.”
Meredith will now work on the set-up of his self run Mitsubishi ahead of the next round of the championship, the Todd's Leap Ulster Rally, which takes place in Ireland over the weekend of August 22-23.
