Innovation head to Swansea

This weekend will see Innovation Motorsports once again wheel out three immaculate Fiesta ST150's for round five of the UK's most talked about rally championship - the Fiesta Sporting Trophy. So far this year the North East based team has prepared and ran more Fiestas than any other company in the UK, and has taken several stage wins, an outright victory and has finished on the podium on more than one occasion. Four different drivers have driven for the team, and this weekend sees yet another new driver join the squad, in the form of twenty eight year old Alan Doncaster.

The Swansea Bay rally is the fifth round of the eight event series, and marks the return to gravel after a brief outing on tarmac on the recent Jim Clark Rally. Driving the first car for the team will be boss of Innovation Motorsports Chris Moore. Chris, partnered by Richard 'wee man' Edwards had a disastrous outing on the Jim Clark Rally, whilst charging hard through the first stage the pair clipped a stone on the inside of a corner and the resulting broken wheel, hub and ball joint paid end to his event prematurely. They made it to the end of the stage on three wheels, amazingly setting a top ten time overall, however their valiant attempt to fix the problem on the road section between stages ended mid way through the second stage when the damaged hub and suspension gave up completely. The same rock caused a further three fiestas to pick up punctures, however that was no consolation for the distraught Geordie firefighter.


'The Jim Clark was a bit of a nightmare for us. We went there determined to put up a good fight as we believed we had the pace to finish on the podium once again. However, it wasn't to be and that was two weeks ago so our efforts are now firmly on this weekends event in Swansea.' He commented.

'Our season has taken quite a blow [with two retirements] so its time to knuckle down and put in a good run of podium finishes to bring our championship hopes alive once again. We need to get back to the form we showed last month when we won the Severn Valley Rally. If we can do that again this weekend then our championship will be firmly back on track!'

Driving the second car for the team will be the young Glaswegian Colin Greer. Colin, with experienced co driver Neil Ewing alongside put in a great performance on the Jim Clark Rally to finish 7th Overall, however a high speed spin on the second stage and resulting suspension damage dropped him out of a potential podium spot. Nonetheless he holds a strong top ten position in the championship and his previous experience of the Swansea Bay stages should stand the Go-Rallying.com backed youngster in good stead.

'I really enjoy the stages down in Swansea' Commented the GreerSport engineer. 'The tyre wear and dust problems we faced on the last gravel event are likely to play a big part in the proceedings once again, however it should be the same for us all. We really need to get a good result this weekend to keep our championship hopes alive!'

An added incentive for both Chris and Colin is that the stages used on this weekends event are also used on Wales Rally GB- the UK's only round of the World Rally Championship. Both drivers are trying to get the budget together to enter a three car Innovation Team on that event so the experience gained this weekend should stand them in good stead.

The rally kicks off early on Saturday morning and features 45 miles of classic south Wales forest stages. To learn more about Innovation Motorsports visit http://www.InnovationMS.com

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