Press Release: Muddy Moo dominates in Scotland

Scottish Perthshire Hillrally 2009

Muddy Moo tackles the gruelling Cambusbarron stage

Witney based off-road racing team Friesian Racing dominated the production categories at the recent Scottish Perthshire Hillrally and scored one of the best ever overall placings for a production based vehicle on the gruelling moorland event with eighth overall and first Super Production car.

“The Perthshire Hillrally is one of the more extreme events on the off-road calendar.” says driver, Henry Webster (Long Hanborough, Witney)

“The open moorland stages in the Ochil Hills above Perth really favour the lighter buggies, so we are thrilled to be so far up the running order!”

Even before the event the team were in a race against time after Henry had crashed their Land Rover Discovery, “Muddy Moo” on a recent foray to the French Tout Terrain championship, where once again the team showed they had the pace to take on the best in Europe.

Some late nights and long weekends in the workshop from all the team, saw Muddy Moo back in fine shape for the Scottish Perthshire Hillrally and ready to take on the worst the terrain could throw at her!

Flat out on the gravel of Fanny Hill

The opening forest stage was one of the few stages where the team could expect to battle for the overall placings, as the smoother flowing nature suited the production cars better than the rough moorland sections. With no chance to play themselves in gently, Henry and co-driver Joel Haylock (Burton Green, Kenilworth) stamped their authority on the event with an eighth fastest on the opening test.

A big impact on the nearside front on the second moorland stage – Cambusbarron, led to a puncture which lost the guys nearly six minutes and dropped them out of the top ten. “The puncture was frustrating!” said Joel.

“As we were really flying up until then and the car was running really well!”

In twelfth place overnight the team had plenty of work to do on the second day. Once again they capitalised on the greater number of forest stages on this year’s event, by taking a fourth fastest and two third fastest times on the sweeping gravel and despite struggling to keep-up with the lightweight specials on the moorland stages, Henry and Joel clawed their way back to an excellent eighth overall and a dominant class win.

A bit of the Pyrenees in central Scotland?

Once again Henry paid tribute to the quality of parts supplied by Abingdon based Land Rover parts wholesaler Allmakes 4×4.

“It’s always a major challenge just to get to the end of a ‘Scottish’, it’s one of the hardest events in the sport and lots of folk don’t make it! For us to do so well here, against the buggies is fantastic and it says amazing things about the quality of the components that Allmakes supply to us!”

“Our new suspension is now also beginning to work wonders – Milner Off Road’s Varidamp racing shockers have enabled us to traverse the terrain much faster than we would have previously thought possible.”

Thanks to Mo and Jo Brinkman for the excellent photos.

Even more Scottish Borders Hillrally – Video

Another fantastic video from the Scottish Borders Hillrally 2008 – including an interview with Henry!  Very many thanks to our new friends Stuart and Ged for this.  Its really great to have so much brilliant video from the event.  Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

I’ve got a few photos to upload in the next day or two so keep your eyes peeled for more updates.

More Scottish Borders 2008 – Video

I’ve just been sent this by our new friend NeilV555 on YouTube.  It includes some fantastic footage featuring us momentarily losing our way on stage 1, evidence of the misfire on the twilight stage and just missing a big tree on the exit to an icy hairpin!

Thanks Neil you’re a star!

2008 Scottish Borders Hillrally – Video

Some great video coverage of the 2008 Scottish Borders Hillrally.  MuddyMoo stars at about 1’25”, 5’20” and 9’10”.

It wasn’t cold, it was Friesian!

Joel checks in to time control Photo: Ronnie Webster

In arctic-style conditions, Friesian Racing continued their domination of the Super Production classes and made a bid for the overall honours on the Scottish Borders Hillrally at the weekend.  A stunning fifth overall was a fantastic result for the team after a trying weekend.

With stages that really suit MuddyMoo and Henry’s driving style and with Joel back on the maps in the forest, we were always hoping for a good result on this end of year bash, especially after last year’s disappointment. We had set ourselves a ‘stretch’ target of a top five finish and we weren’t disappointed.

Day 1 dawned as a frosty and cold November morning and even by the time that we had reached the start of stage 1 at about lunch time, the tracks were still completely covered in ice in the exposed areas.  Slippery conditions were definitely the order of the day and any thought of heroics on day one were firmly out of the window.  Survival was clearly going to be the key to success on this event.

MuddyMoo rolls into service for the final time Photo: Ronnie Webster

Despite the steady start, and an annoying misfire which plagued them for several stages, Joel and Henry found themselves in fourth place before the final stage of the day – a twilight 16 miler!  Although the team dropped back to 7th overnight with the misfire finally cured, the team were more than content with the days work.

A layer of snow greeted the early risers on Sunday morning and provided a whole set of new challenges.  Ice was tricky enough on the Saturday stages, but at least it was fairly distinguishable from the more grippy gravel sections.  With a full coating of snow, the underlying ice was much less predictable and almost impossible to spot.  Henry had hoped to push hard on the early stages of day two, but the prevailing conditions suggested that once more a more circumspect approach may be more pragmatic.  MuddyMoo’s predictable handling in the slippery, snowy and icy initial corners of the stage allowed the team to gain confidence in the conditions and settle into a good rhythm quickly and set a brace of good times in the opening stages.

Now in sixth place the Friesian crew took a further 40 seconds off their times in each of the re-run final stages, and despite a heroic last lap dash from Niall Meehan in his Tomcat to place him fourth, the Friesian crew did enough to secure the sought after fifth place, a mere two seconds ahead of Robin and Nat Rymell in their Mud Rover.

A very many thanks must go to all our supporters.  First of all the Friesian Racing herd; Joel for his excellence in road reading, that gave me the confidence to push on in the tricky conditions.  Andrew for his tireless expertise and willingness to get stuck in, no matter what the conditions are like!  Sue for her fantastic attention to detail and for always asking the questions that no-one else has picked up on!  My mother Ronnie for endlessly cleaning the sponsors names, catering and for gracefully wiping my feet everytime I got back into the saddle!  And of course, my father, Nigel for his constant help in building and maintaining MuddyMoo to such a high standard and for his detailed approach to all the event logistics and planning without which I would be lost.

Henry and Joel (L&R) collect their prize from rally director Ian Sykes

Thanks must also go to our sponsors, Allmakes 4×4 for continuing to supply us with the best in Land Rover parts to enable us to maintain our excellent reliablity record with a Super Production car, and to allow us to push the envelope ever further to challenge the expensive specials that dominate the sport.  Milner, too, whose remote-reservoir Varidamps have enabled us to move significantly up the pecking order, with the ability to maintain the pace in the rough, as well as contributing to the car’s fantastic poise in the fast stuff!