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Cyprus Rally
Production Car World Rally Championship Rd.4
20 to 22 Jun. 2003 |
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Toshihiro Arai aims to win third serial events.
Preview
Event News
19 Jun. 2003 Half around the world and almost a month after previous Argentina, 21 PCWRC teams gathered from all over the world to Round 4 of PCWRC held in the Mediterranean resort island of Cyprus. In Subaru, Toshihiro Arai of Subaru Production Rally Team (SPRT) who won Round 2 New Zealand and Round 3 Argentina after introducing the New Impreza; Stig Blomqvist (Sweden) and Martin Rowe (UK) who skipped the previous Argentina round; and Patrick Richard of Canada entered the event. Their rivals are top drivers like Karamjit Singh (Malaysia / Proton) who is 3 points behind Arai in the Championship; Daniel Sola (Spain / Mitsubishi Lancer), and Marcos Ligato (Argentina / Mitsubishi Lancer) joined the event. For Arai, in order to keep his position on top of the Championship ranking, winning many points is essential. In other words, his rivals need to take him down in order to seek chance to out throw Arai. Perhaps this will be the highlight of the event this week, and to whom the island born Venus smiles will be an issue everyone will keep an eye for. Rally will start from Thursday the 19th at LEMESOS, the center of southern coast. 3 day event starting from 20th holds 18 stages, approximately 340 km in competition. In this time of the year, Cyprus has steaming sunlight, and the temperature will rise to 40ºC during the day. However, in the morning and the evening, the cool wind form the Mediterranean Sea is comfortable; ideal European resort island. 
Arai arrived in Cyprus on June 13th and worked on the physical training to adjust the environment to cope with the physically abusive event. From the 16th, he and the co-driver Tony Sircomb made thorough recce, and instead of taking part in the official shakedown on the 19th, they run the private test prepared by the team.During the test held at the occupied road near the stage on Leg3, the team tested the set up of the suspension system revised after Argentina, and went over the anti-heat strategies. The suspension had altered the position of the front reserve tank in order to prevent heating. "It's not that I don't like hot rallies." Added Arai checking the cooling suits (a vest with coolant sewn on). Driving through out the 4.5 km rough roads in two hours, the team is ready for the event. Takeshi Ito, Representative of SPRT pointed "this rally is one of the most rough event of the season, and it is most important not to damage the car. Winning 2 events in a row should not make us take off our guards, and I have already told Arai that winning points is the priority." 
Arai added "This is very unique rally, but I've been here 3 times and also won good result with WR Car in 2001 so it is one of my favorites. We have enough data, and are able to set the car right for this track. The engine works well on the car, and suspension is effective We just don't want to lose the rally with damages to the car and punctures, so we will plan to take it slow checking the other cars in the beginning The purpose of this event is to finish on the podium, but obviously, we will go for winning if there is a chance."According to Arai, the track is much rough compared to last year. Many rains during the winter made ditches cutting cross the track, and since the surface is hardened with graders, there are some areas where is undulation left on the track. Also, many of the stages are twisty, the average speed of the cars are low, and areas with rock the size in the river banks fill the area. The official PCWRC schedule for 19th was only the ceremonial start in the evening, Arai decided to concentrate to go over the pace notes, and to be focused on the event. |
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