“I would dearly love to win the championship again and I think there is a realistic opportunity there to do it this year. “Last year I probably did take a bit of a back seat role and this year I’d prefer not to do that,” said the ever-competitive Bates. Team owner Neal Bates admits he took something of a back seat to TTR’s exciting new signing last year, but says he is ready to show this year why he won three national titles. “Last year we were behind the eight-ball with the cars’ development, but I think we are equal with the others this year and if that’s the case we can win the championship.” “I want to finish every event on the podium and that should give us the championship. It won’t change the way I drive, but I’ll have a buffer zone to get to the finish. “At times last year I was driving as fast as I could and not getting the times, which made me frustrated. It’s just that I’ll be driving at ten-tenths and not eleven-tenths," Evans said. "I’m going to drive smarter this year, but I will be just as lethal.
#Lotto sorcerer v8. driver#
TTR driver Simon Evans proved that the team was ready to challenge for the championship with a spirited challenge last year that saw him leading on points after 5 of the 12 heats.Įvans is now more determined than ever to win his maiden title after getting a sniff last year before eventually having to settle for an excellent third place trophy.Įvans has also revealed a more mature approach to his quest.
The first two boxes have been ticked off – sorting the cars out in year one and scoring podium finishes in year two – and now the big challenge awaits.
#Lotto sorcerer v8. full#
Sydney driver Martin Lintott has bought Bates’ 2004 car and will contest the full ARC season as TTR’s first customer entry.Īll three TTR Corollas will ride on Michelin tyres and continue to rely on Caltex lubricants.Īs the third year of an initial three-year plan, there was never any question that Toyota Team Racing would go into the 2005 season with anything less than the goal to win the Globalstar Australian Rally Championship. Two new cars have been built for Bates and Simon Evans, while TTR’s development driver Ben Barker will drive the Corolla built for Evans late last year, which was only used in the last two rounds.īarker’s 2004 Corolla is now a dedicated TTR test car. The team has also made cosmetic changes to the appearance of the Corolla, updating the nose to that adopted by the production Corollas as part of a mid-cycle facelift last year. These developments should level the playing field,” he said. “Again it’s a feature that our competition has enjoyed for some time. At times we were having to do three point turns,” Bates said. “On some of the rallies last year, especially Queensland, we lost a heap of time to the opposition because we didn’t have a handbrake. The team will also benefit from the addition of a hydraulic park brake actuator, which will make the Corollas more competitive on tighter stages. “Last year, Simon and I had only one mechanical DNF (did not finish) for the year between us, which is a pretty amazing achievement,” he said. TTR engineers are confident the Corolla will retain its reputation for reliability. With the improvements we’ve found over the off-season, I’m confident we’re on schedule,” he said.
The first year was about development, the second was about podiums and the third is about winning the championship. “We said from the outset that TTR was on a three year plan. They should also improve reliability over the course of a rally,” he said.īates is confident the locally developed 2005 TTR Corollas are now capable of matching the pace of the Group N factory models in the Globalstar Australian Rally Championship. “The changes we’ve made are mostly about making the car more stable and easier to control. He said most of the development work over the summer had focused on improving the handling and lateral grip of the Corollas. From a driver’s point of view, they feel great to drive but we won’t really know how we’re placed competitively until the first rally," he said. "We’re very happy with where the cars are at. Team owner Neal Bates said the test, which mainly focused on individual driver suspension set-ups, had left the team in a buoyant mood heading into the new season. The team recently completed the final stage of an extensive off-season development program with a two-day test in Queensland. The 2005 season gets underway in Canberra on April 22 with the same line-up as last year – Neal Bates with Coral Taylor, Simon and Sue Evans, and Ben Barker with Damien Long. Toyota Team Racing will tackle this year’s Globalstar Australian Rally Championship with a better handling and more reliable car than the one that took Simon Evans to third place in last year’s drivers’ championship.
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