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2006 Dutton Rally National Championship
Australia
September 16-17th, 2006
Place: 1st
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Dutton Rally Round 4 2006 VIC
September 14-16th, 2006
Place: 2nd
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Dutton Rally Round 2 2006 NSW
June 1-3rd, 2006
Place: 3rd
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Dutton Rally Round 1 2006 Perth WA
February 23-25th, 2006
Place: 1st
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Victorian Dutton Rally |
Various VIC
Arthur and Notaras finish up on top in VIC, this victory completes a clean sweep of the National series for the team. Simon won 5 stages outright
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Canberra's Martin Notaras and Simon Arthur are the conquering kings of this year's all-new Alphera Dutton Rally National Series, their victory in last weekend's round in Victoria making it three wins from three starts.
The pair drove almost flawlessly last weekend [July 29-31], in a tough battle with not only their regular national series rivals, but also with a particularly seriously competitive Victorian contingent.
Last year's Victorian event winners - Melbourne son-and-father team, Andrew and Ernie Fuller - were tossing everything they could into the ring, as was the Victoria/SA combination of former gravel rally specialist Jeff Beaumont and circuit racer Peter Gazzard, but Notaras and Arthur were just too clean and too quick. A total of 98 cars and around 180 drivers lined up for the Victorian event, with entrants coming from Queensland, WA, SA, Tasmania, NSW, ACT and Victoria.
The final results for the Victorian round - which was the very first of the Alphera Dutton Rally events (then NSW, with Queensland added this year) - showed Notaras and Arthur as the best of the best, with archrivals and fellow Canberra residents, Greg Sutton and Bernie Wilson second, and Beaumont and Gazzard third. The Fullers, who were first last year, had to settle for fourth for 2005.
After tallying points from the results of those competing in all three states, it was Notaras/Arthur, Sutton/Wilson and Brisbane's Mark Berry and Russell Newman, the only crew in the top five NOT driving an EVO of some kind. Their result is just short of a miracle. During the last stages of competition - a motorkhana at Melbourne's Essendon Airport - contact was made with a gutter which broke the front left control arm of their Nissan Skyline GTR.
Fortunately for the Skyline crew, a group of local Skyline Club members had come to watch the activities and one of them offered Berry and Newman the corresponding part from his car. A quick remove-and-refit effort followed, with the Queenslanders going on to record perfect runs and a perfect finish. They then returned the part to the generous donor (with a "thankyou gift") and joined the post-event celebrations.
While the Alphera Dutton Rally series is designed to encourage team points gathering, individual crew members' abilities are also acknowledged. The top three drivers in the Victorian round were Andrew Fuller, Martin Notaras and V8 Supercar star, Steve Richards. The top co-drivers were Peter Gazzard, Bernie Wilson and Simon Arthur.
Amongst the national contenders it was Notaras, Sutton and Berry claiming the top drivers points, with Arthur, Wilson and Brisbane's Mick Jones taking the podium for the co-drivers points tally. The Alphera Dutton Rally Victoria included three days of competition at venues around Shepparton, Benalla and Melbourne. Competitors tackled around 20 individual events (two attempts at each) such as motorkhanas, sprints, circuit laps and skidpans, the balance aimed at ensuring that cars better suited to tight, twisty conditions were evenly matched against those with straight-line speed.
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