Kris Hall dominates Malcolm Wilson Rally
Date: 14-04-2009Rising MSA Rally Elite star Kris Hall stormed to victory on the opening round of the Kick Energy Fiesta SportTrophy U.K.
The newly appointed Elite driver was seeded first Fiesta on the opening round, the Cumbrian based Malcolm Wilson Rally. Hall had one aim coming into the event and that was to take maximum points on his local event.
Hall had planned to contest either the Riponian Rally or the North Humberside event as preparation for the opening round. Unfortunately both were cancelled, making the Malcolm Wilson Rally the young Cumbrian’s first outing since the Fiesta Shootout back in December. Despite no competing for 3 months it didn’t seem to phase Hall with a fantastic time on the first stage beating nearest rival Craig Breen from Ireland by 6 seconds in the short 3 mile stage. Hall’s dominance continued with 2 more convincing fastest times despite a small misfire. As the rally left the Lake’s stages in Whinlatter, there was a sting in the tail for Hall as the rally moved to the M-Sport owned forest of Greystoke for stage 4. This was to turn the competition on its head with Hall suffering from a fuel pump failure dropping over a minute and I turn demoting him to 3rd Fiesta. Breen’s rally also took a bad turn with gear box problems forcing him to retire robbing him of a great score for the opening round. In a comfortable 3rd at this point was Matt Edwards but a puncture dropped him a minute also. After both Barry Greer and Stevie Brown had driveshaft problems early on, their rally was an up hill struggle from the start.
Hall’s disappointment of losing the rally lead was obvious at service but he remained confident in his service crew to solve the problem in the short time provided. He said “It was a heart in mouth moment when the pump started going. I was unsure if we could get it to service but we have and hopefully we will get away on time. We had managed to pull a good gap on most of the lads but now we are behind by around half a minute so I will be pushing hard to get that 1st place back”. Sure enough the service team replaced the component and managed to get Hall out in time. In all the drama new man on the block Stefan Davies took a 36 second lead over Hall with only four stages to go. In second was Kyle Orr ten seconds ahead of Hall.
It was all to do for the local youngster as his 30 second advantage over the chasing crews earlier on now had reversed to over a 30 second deficit. None the less a committed charge from Hall saw him take back 31 seconds from Davies and 36 from Orr on stage 5 then a further 24 seconds on the penultimate stage, seeing Hall comfortably take back the lead. Winning the final stage confirmed that the Stobart and Ast Signs backed youngster took an emphatic opening round win. He was awarded the Castrol Hard Charger award for his 6 out of 7 fastest stage times and he took maximum points in the Championship. Hall won his class by a convincing 54 seconds to Matt Edwards despite the minute loss earlier in the day. Kyle Orr rounded off the top 3. Hall was also 3rd 2wd and 18th O/A on the event that attracted over 100 entries.
Hall now leads the Kick Energy Fiesta SportTrophy U.K 2009 heading into the second round, the Bulldog International Rally based in north Wales. Coverage of the Championship can be found on the Rally Zone television program on Sky Sports.
