GOULD SETS GREAT PIRELLI PACE BEFORE FALLING FOUL OF KIELDER
20/04/2009
Adam Gould might have missed the opportunity to challenge for his first ever British Rally Championship podium position on the Pirelli International Rally, which finished in Carlisle last night, but the 21-year-old Pirelli Star Driver bagged plenty more experience at the highest level aboard his Subaru Impreza WRX.
Gould was running fifth when he slid off the road on the fifth stage of the event in what is likely to be the most frustrating accident of his career. The car was completely undamaged, but left lying at the bottom of one of Kielder's notoriously deep ditches.
Prior to his problem, Gould had been a model of speed and consistency. He immediately played himself into a car running new suspension and revised differential set-up from the first time out on the Bulldog International Rally of North Wales, where he finished fourth on his debut as Pirelli's 2009 UK Star Driver.
Growing in confidence with the car, Gould's times improved and he was looking to move up the leaderboard when he slipped into a ditch on the exit of one of the artificial chicanes put on the road by the organisers.
The exasperated Gould said: "This was such a frustrating event for me and, obviously, I feel badly for Pirelli and the TEG Sport team. I know there was more speed to come in the afternoon and I know that we could have been fighting for the podium, but instead I made a schoolboy error. We were coming out of the chicane and I cut the last part, running across a ditch, like I had been doing on all of the other chicanes. The front wheel dropped in, but I was sure the power would pull us out. It didn't."
Instead, Gould and his co-driver Sebastian Marshall dropped into the ditch and out of the rally at 20mph. With only four spectators on hand, there would be no chance of lifting the Impreza back onto the stage. Instead, Gould was left to ponder the mistake which cost him dearly on what was only his 24th ever event.
"Experience counts for a huge amount in this sport," he said. "And I learned a very valuable lesson on this rally. I knew the recce was important, but this has underlined that every single corner, every single exit of every single chicane has to be pin-point accurate in our pacenotes. If it's not, this is what can happen. The other positive I take from this rally is the speed we showed on the stages. I know I was driving within myself."
Gould's next outing will be the third round of the BRC, the all-asphalt Jim Clark International Rally (May 22-23), starting in Edinburgh, but running through the super-fast Scottish Border lanes.
"I'm really looking forward to the Jim Clark," said Gould. "I had a great result there last year, when I finished in the top 10 in a two-wheel-drive car, so I have fond memories of those roads. That said, it's going to be a challenge to go there and learn about everything about the car on asphalt. The good thing is that we have a test before the start, so we can start from scratch and learn about setting the car up there."
Martin Pallot, Pirelli motorsport manager said: "I'm really disappointed for Adam. He was going very, very well and setting some great stage times. He drove well in the stages on Friday night and was making some positive changes to the car's suspension set-up and he's been caught out by a fairly typical Kielder-type incident. There's plenty more of the season to come yet, so we look forward to the next outing."
