 Proposing, addictive, and often unforgiving with an adrenaline rush like no other. There is no practice, no second chances. It's the ultimate motorsport competition on gravel. It is rally and this is the East Coast All Bars Australian Rally Championship coming to you from Gippsland in Victoria. It's the final round of the national series. The decider, Scott Pedder leads from Brendan Reeves but after his crash in the pre-event power stage the balance might just be swinging back to Reeves. On the menu today we'll feature the fight between the Rally School Mazda 2 and the Walkinshaw Performance Renault Clio. We'll highlight the final of the Junior Rally Challenge. It's come down to two young men into very different cars. Tom Ryan in a rear-drive Toyota Altezza up against Guy Tyler in the front-wheel-drive Renault Clio. And of course we'll highlight the Australian side-by-side challenge. One last battle for the season between Polaris and Canair. Begin today with a recap of the East Coast All Bars ARC. Scott Pedder still leads Brendan Reeves after near disaster for the championship leader in the Armour All Power stage. Team Citroen occupy third and fourth but Mick Patton's chances of retaining fifth in the championship took a setback as the Repco Polo was withdrawn after a second pre-event crash, this time in testing. Scott Pedder's mistake in the power stage was a setback for himself and Dale Moskert but he remains upbeat. Put it behind you and you know it's at five points but in the grand scheme of things it's not going to affect much. We were having a great run in the power stage and I made the final mistake of getting ahead of myself and saying to myself just get through, get through because we had a good start to that stage and took my mind off it from one little bit and ran wide. For Brendan Reeves and Rhiannon Gelsimino, it's one step at a time. First, the power stage. Then, heat one and heat two. And with ticked one box, now goes afternoon four stages to concentrate on. The stages look very dry compared to last year. Really hard on the Kumo tyres, we're running the hard but I think it's still going to be very hard on them and we'll see a lot of tyre wear and probably some front to rearing of tyres as well from the cruise. That's our plan at the moment and we'll see how that works. While the Citroens will fight for the spoils of third and fourth, there is another element that could change the complexion of this weekend. The reigning Australian rally champion, Eli Evans, has returned for his home event. The regular co-driver went western in the repowered and revamped Honda Type R Civic that they campaigned for the seasons ago. There is only one thing on their minds. It's here to win. I might be a nuisance to the other guys and well, this makes it interesting for the championship as well so, but I want to get a win for the Type R so, let's see how we go. The reavers must win both beats if he's to have any chance of winning his first championship. So, having the registered Evans in play this weekend could help. I'm happy Eli is here because there's an opportunity there that he could bridge a gap between myself and Pettah, but who knows, he might win the rally as well in the end. So, we'll just keep pushing on, judge it like a normal rally, every stage by stage and just see what we can do at the end of the heat one. If he can beat Evans into second, that would further diminish the points he'll offer for Scott and hose the gap. It's a numbers game and Steve McKenzie adds well into the equation. He and his younger brother Brent were unable to start the final of the armoured power stage through suspension failure, but the Opticode Ford Fiesta showed great form, easily qualified and they too are registered and could be the ticket for reeds. Scott Pettah has never won a championship, but his co-driver has and no doubt Dale Moskut has every possible scenario covered this weekend to ensure a win. Ross Duncan and Dean Herridge have also been looking at just how things could pan out. Pettah might be more concerned than he's letting on. Final round of the championship, Ross Duncan and what an armoured power stage. I've just spoken to Scott Pettah and he is devastated. Big moment for him. Looks like he could get away, but he's got to see Brent and Reza, he capitalised. He certainly did, but you've got to remember in this event we see the return of the current Australian rally sheave in Eli Evans. He's a local and he can be a real party spoiler, couldn't he? He certainly could. These roads here in Rally Victoria, what are they like? Every year I've come here, I've had the waterproof gear, the big galoshes on. This time, dry and dusty and I think this is the first time that the Australian Rally Championship has run on dusty, dirty roads in Victoria. It could be. It's been overcast though, we could still get a little bit of that rain, so there's plenty to think about and it is going to build up to be a great finale for us. This is going to be one great event. And that event begins right after the break. You're watching the final round of the East Coast Bull Bass Australian Rally Championship being held in Kippsland, Victoria. The classics have swept the roads of loose gravel, but the first championship car on the road discovers not nearly well enough. The early skier, hardly slow, got better. He and Dale Moskett cover the 18 kilometre opening pioneer stage in 11 minutes and 58 seconds. A lot slipperier than I thought. A lot more gravel on the road and it just made the classic guys probably say the same thing. Very slippery and, you know, the car was good, made a few first two corners, the half spins just so slippery, but hey, better than this morning. His overall power stage gaff still clearly on his mind, but not affecting his driving performance. Eli Evans is next, hot on his heels. The reigning champion keen to show he and the re-powered Honda have what it takes to win. Three in, then right for it. Titans won late in almost to the end. Only three pay to go. I think we made the right tight choice in there, but we're probably going to drive shaft, so we're out pretty much there. The news Brendan Reeves was hoping for. The rally school Mazda 2 just three seconds off Pettis pace, Reeves very aware of the road surface. I can see the other guys where they've been making mistakes and the guys making the same mistakes in a lot of spots. Yeah, that's a shame Eli's out because that sort of throws our hopes unless Scott makes a mistake. Hopefully these guys behind can keep pushing. Turbo boost pressure problems hamper Steve Mackenzie and Coach Fiesta. The engine should be reading one bar, but as the dash indicates it regularly drops to 0.2. Still the brothers return third fastest time and have no problem with the road surface. Yeah, the roads are excellent. The car's sitting on the road also at the moment. Just having a bit of control with boost pressure. I'm not sure what's happening, but it's dropping down to 0.2 of a bar, then I pick a gear and it comes to life again. I'm not sure what to go there is. I think it's just a tune, something with the tune. To short left six. Both Citroens have been displaced by the Fiesta. Sullen's the quicker of the two despite having never competed in this event. If I could sparely conservative through there, I didn't really want to push too hard. I thought I'd flapped for a while and it was very tally in a few spots. Short for an off left and hug through right loop titans. I feel weird. His teammate has other issues. Oh, I can't concentrate, I'm f***ing spaced out. Weird, I couldn't concentrate, I got a really spicy and weird sensation. Just 100, try and turn it off and power it back up and see if it fixes it. The opening stage in the Junior Challenge isn't good for Guy Tyler. We did a right, we seemed to go into limbo for like 500 metres, we switched it off, switched it back on again, it was fine. Just warming up, you know, mate. Yeah, had a few close moments, but nothing too bad, so see how we do. Nine left, eight right, and eight left narrows. He does hold off Tom Ryan though. The road surface clearly in favour of the front wheel drive. Keep it on the road, keep it on the road, and care pressed, nine left. Just really super in there. If you haven't come up long enough, a wheel weight just steps out, so I'll wait for him to break and stuff down here. He's a little bit nervous, so you're going to have to watch out for that stuff. A bit nervous there, bro? Just a little bit, just a little bit caught me off guard when we're sliding a little bit more than I thought it was. Winning Heat 1 is paramount for both Pedder and Reeves, but tyre issues affect everyone, and just how that's managed might be the difference between winning and losing. The Walkenshore Renault pushes on through guns only 14 kilometres, but the tyres are being punished. Switch immediate 3 plus right. With engine power and steering all going through the front wheels, those tyres suffer more wear than the rears. There's little time between stages, but Reeves and Gelsimino manage to swap rears to front in a bid to give themselves better grip. It works, six seconds up on Pedder, and with that, the Heat lead at the halfway point. Tomorrow is nothing if we don't win today, so it's why we wanted to put the big effort in today, especially if Eli out. We're hoping Eli would be really fast. Mackenzie's fast, that's really good. He's not quite up there, but Scott could still have a problem where anything can happen. It's a long rally, and they're fast, tricky stages. A clean run with no boost issues for the Mackenzie brothers through the second stage. Once they get started, just 0.4 of a second behind Pedder, even with the stall, shows the potential of this up-and-coming rally team. I'm stoked with the times, and there's extra room for improvement in there. We're having a bit of an issue with the turbo here. That's not creating boost. At certain points, I'm not sure why. So I think Scott is going to be downloading some data and sending it off to MoTeX right now. Hopefully they'll have a look at it and see what it's doing. Coppin bounces back through SS2. Nothing dizzy about him or the drive this stage. Just a three-second lead over Sullins. Got time back off Tony, so back in the third, which is good, because Eli stopped in there, but I didn't see him, so I'm not sure what's going on there. But it felt really good in that last on-the-cars dance from corner to corner, which is always a good thing. Not a good thing, but it's on Ryan. Straight 150. With $5,000 on offer for the junior title, say nothing for free registration for the 2015 season, a free entry to rally Australia, 20 Kumo tyres and a handful of other worthy prizes, Tom Ryan is going to have to hope Guy Tyler has problems. Right now he isn't, and the young South Australian is eyeing off the prize. At the pointy end, Scott Petter is eyeing off the main prize, and strategy is becoming even more critical. We're going to take a change of tyres after the next one, because we think if we can win the heat, then that takes a hell of a lot of pressure off us for tomorrow. Brando's already shown his cards, and he's front to back, so he's four tyres down now. So we'll see how we go with that. Just 16 Kumos are allowed for the rally this weekend, and already some teams are on track to use eight in heat one that represents just one-third of the rally. For our race leader, things are still on track. We're just putting it all into today. Keep ourselves up there, keep the pressure on, Scotty. Back to rally Victoria, you're watching the East Coast Ball Bars Australian Rally Championship. The second half of heat one is a repeat of the two opening stages. Only this time the roads have been swept in the loose gravel. The hard surface below might be causing excessive tyre wear, but it also delivers better grip, as Inheridge explains. You'll often hear our Australian Championship drivers talk about being on the swept line, or out in the loose and even row position being very important. What does it actually mean? I've come down to the special stage here that'll be used in rally Victoria to give you a great example. We've got a left-hand corner here. I've got my tyres that I borrowed from Scott Peter for five minutes, and you can see here inside of the corner, swept line. So much gravel's already gone. We've got some of the rubber already being picked up and taken off the tyres. So this left front is going through the real rigours of trying to give the guys good grip, maintain its compound and give the car a good feel through the corners. On the outside, loose stuff. Out in the loose, the guys will tell us, out in the loose and couldn't get any traction. So now our tyre's not dealing with that. On this side, it's trying to bite in through with the tread depth and give our guys a bite and maintain speed and not lose too much time. So of course, we've got to have adaptable tyres to suit this, compounds that the drivers will choose from, and of course, if you throw the rain in, it's got to cope with mud as well. Clear skies, so no problem with muddy roads today, the tyre wear issues are extreme. As Scott Pettis said, winning this heat would be important in psychological terms. He knows this is a winning time. If Brendo's beaten that, then he's done a really good job. Brendo Kutt, a distraction mid-stage, causes him to slow. It's a suspected flat, but he makes the finish with all Kumos intact. There's no chance to swap tyres front to back this time, so they're forced into the final stage of the day using badly worn tyres. We won't have time now. They're not as bad as last time, because I was up chaining earlier and then took it a bit easier at the last part of the stage, because we didn't know what was wrong. We thought it must have been a puncher, because there was a hell of a noise coming from the rear, and the swaybar link jamming in the wheel. With the broken swaybar removed, Reeves now has a seven-second deficit to claw back the heat wear movement. Selecting gears early seems to help see Mackenzie's issue with dropping turbo boost. He's still 12 seconds behind the stage leader, but he is third in stage and ahead of the Citroens. Subtle suspension changes to Tony Sullen's car towards him with fifth, sixth clear of Adrian Colvin. We're right, Luke. He asked it to be maybe 70. Unbelievably, his crew has somehow fitted mismatched profile tyres to the DS3, and it's terrible to drive. He and Tim Batten change one to correct the problem for the final stage, but it won't be enough to beat his teammate in the first heat. Then a right-line pair tied short for in line. Eli Evans rejoins with a replacement driveshaft, but in an effort to bank tyres for an assault on the final heat, he and Glenn Weston are using the same cumos from the first pass. Yeah, I can feel it. Made for some interesting braking down the hill. Evans withdraws to consolidate his tyres for heat, too. Today's battle is over, there's nothing more to be gained. Everything to be gained for Petter, though. He and Moskater are at one with the Renault and can smell a heat victory. Over 13 kilometres, the pair is 23 seconds quicker than their last pass. Reeves is on the road and yet to finish. It's another significant moment in the championship for Petter and Moskater. Yes! The psychological advantage is theirs. Further back, the young guns in the Fiesta are learning the art of driving with fading tyre tread. Two Corollas join the mix this round from within the state. Ashley James driving a car he won a national two-wheel drive championship with more than a decade ago. And Graham Redcliffe in a more standard-powered version of the popular Toyota. Neither can match the times of the current spec two-wheel drives but watch this space for their moves next season. Both Corollas have been running behind another Victorian Alan Rowe in the day of focus. Rowe and Steve Glenny collect fifth in stage and the heat thanks to the Honda's withdrawal and the sideline Fiesta. Sullen's leads coppin' in the Citroen race for minor placings but with just one heat remaining, Scott Petter extends his lead over Brendan Reeves in the championship. On paper, only a DNF will see Petter miss his first national title. That's happened before though at this very rally when two flat tyres changed the championship outcome at the very last stage. There's still one final day of competition left in the East Coast Bullbars ARC but that action will unfold shortly but coming up, it's driving side-by-side challenge. Back to the East Coast Bullbars ARC. While the outcome of the national championship was still to be decided, the Australian side-by-side challenge was in the bag for Filaris. The superiority of the red machine in 2014 was evident from the start with the introduction of their Razor 1000. As Michael Guest alluded to last round things are set to change with Cannan introducing their turbo-powered machine next season. It will be game on. Interestingly, coming into this round Nathan Shivers was ahead of the factory Cannam driver and eager to consolidate his second position overall but Ian Hughes was an early upset. Hughes and the Eagle Power Sports Polaris upstaged everyone including category leader Cody Crocker winning the opening battle over the total 2km pioneer stage by two seconds. Crocker hit back next stage though through guns four in front to retake the rally lead. Michael Guest was the quickest of the Cannam drivers but had to settle for third through most of the heat-one stages. He's driving really well and they've got a really good package at the moment and I think the pressure between him and Cody is you can see they're really fighting and at the moment it's going to be a big effort from us just to stay in front of Ian really today. By SS4, Guest had the measure of Hughes beating the Polaris pilot by one second but Guesty and Dave Green were forced to settle for third for the heat on a day when tyre wear was a hot topic. And it's the most tyre wear I've seen in the side by sides ever here just with the abrasive roads and super dry conditions and yeah we're actually seeing some tyre wear which is good from our perspective because generally in the side by sides they're pretty easy on everything including tyres and it's good to see them wearing straight 50, 7 left short 50, 8 left entry, 4 right Nathan Shivers was doing his best to stay with the leaders in his Can-Am Maverick but smaller wheels were hindering his chances. Yeah I've got just the 12 inch wheels and I've got 25 inch tyres and he's got 14 inch wheels with 28s so yeah mine's a little bit better out of the start and a little bit better on the tight stuff but I'm losing the top speed quite a bit on all the straights. A flat for Shivers Junior in the opening stage of Heat 2 left the door open for Father Lez running a similar machine. He and Peter Harris grabbing the family spoils when and wherever possible. Crocker held on for the stage win through SS6 by just one second over guest but a moment mid stage could have changed all that tyre wear and new experience for the side by sides. We're hearing the ARC feel certainly struggling with tyres and we are too we haven't actually had this much tyre wear on our tyres so they're not wearing right out but they're getting quite low and then very very slippery so we're punishing the brakes, punishing the tyres but you know it's pretty fast we're going pretty quick in some stages we're up there with some of the ARC cars so we're pretty happy with that. While Crocker is not competing with the main ARC his history as a top level rally competitor makes it difficult for him not to be watching their times. Crocker's third side by side challenge title in a row comes on the back of four APRC championships and before that three Australian rally championship titles competition is in his blood. Crocker expected competition from Michael Guest that was the nature of establishing the two make series with two top level drivers but now some of the competition is coming from within his own can. It's the last time we invite Ian to come along to a rally isn't it? But he's been flying leaving last year he got second in the series and he's winning stages here as well so he's right under it and full credit to him it's a fantastic job there to hold Guesti off and that was part of our plan too was if we needed to get some points I mean between us that would be really nice and he's done more than that even so he's going really well. Yeah I've done a couple of good stages it's very out of all the rallies I've done this has been the hardest on the car you know sort of tyres every two stages are gone and brake pads a few stages where the brake pedal has actually gone to the floor over the finish line so I can't believe how hard it actually is on them but yeah there's a bit of a battle going on I really am this event trying to trust my pace notes my mind corners and trusting what my pace notes say and so far it's been working with the background in off-road racing the added dimension of pace notes has a real appeal to Hughes I still love rally a lot more than the off-road I'm going to get shot for saying that but yeah it's a lot better putting his money where his mouth is Hughes and David Piper win both runs over the Bunya Preverse stage but Michael Guest had enough time up his sleeve to hold off the late charge Can-Am second for him too but second equal with Hughes for the weekend Cody Crocker made a 10 consecutive competition wins in rally in as many years in three categories of formidable feet by any stretch Final beat of the East Coast Bullbars Australian Rally Championship is set to go right after the break Welcome back to the last heat of the East Coast Bullbars Australian Rally Championship a championship that's come down to this last heat Scott Petter is about to embark on what is arguably the most important day of rallying in his career I think yesterday was probably more important for us because it set up today we had a decision to make halfway through yesterday whether we can serve and probably put some more pressure on ourselves today or you know more close enough and we thought well take a few extra ties and we can win this day today and put a lot of icing on the cake I'm privileged to actually have a chance to still win today we've come down to the last heat on the last round so that's pretty great that someone hasn't wrapped it up already so it's a good opportunity to have 130 Ks today so we're really playing with tyre strategy now no one knows what to do we've really only got eight new tyres and two that are average that have been on the rear yesterday The big talk though this morning is tyres and it's at the forefront of both drivers minds Look the kumos are doing a great job The roads and conditions are torturous you know you've got uphill headings on very dry rocky bony sort of surface so any tyre is going to struggle in those conditions We've got 24 Ks now and then the 13 Ks stage yesterday I did 18 Ks and 13 and my tyres had canvas so I've got more Ks this morning than yesterday so who knows what's going to happen and is a lot cooler now than it was yesterday but the stage looks very abrasive so it's going to be anyone's race we'll see what happens Eli's got plenty of tyres I think he's laughing at all of us We should have the advantage but I keep saying that Brendan's got to go really fast and I've got a bit of work to do yet and try and get this tyre part right and hopefully we can win some stages today and maybe get the heat wing Now it's been a long time since I've seen the amount of tyre wear and it's all due to the dry rough hard road conditions Some leading crews have already used half of their allocation and they've got 2 thirds of the rally to go Some upon complaining whether or not to go up and above their allocation and take a time penalty but with rain forecast in the dying hours of this event their game plans could change Evans and Western begin well fastest of the favourites but only by just 0.3 of a second over Pedder Ironically in the Citroen camp there's conflicting opinions about tyres Unfortunately we absolutely toasted 2 tyres yesterday afternoon tried to manage it the first one but they would just trash 3 quarters of the way through I don't know, I never wear tyres out I've never done it all my life I don't know whether I just don't drive fast I don't know what the store is but I only used 4 tyres yesterday effectively the 2 tyres on the back now are the ones we ran all day so I've got enough to put 200 against the odds and even his own admission Sullens is driving faster than he has all season and on roads he's never competed on before he is 4th over the 24k stage and 11 seconds in front of his team mate all the stars master line today for Reeves and Gelsomino but they aren't and that despite Pedder finishing 3rd in stage in a bid to preserve tyres a jammed rock damages the rim and forces a wheel change the game of rally is getting tough for the siblings former ARC contender and local Glenn Raymond did start yesterday in the bright Rx7 but gearbox issues sidelined him early now back in the hunt for heat 2 he is on the road 2 minutes behind Brendo but his dust will create havoc for the crew chasing down a fast glimmer of tidal hope Reeves is not the only one affected by dust with his team mate making him work for 3rd in the championship Adrian Koppen is slowed by the rally school Mazda's dust the true potential of young Steve Mackenzie might not have materialised in heat 1 but the imprint come out of the blocks to make their mark today SS5, Benny's up goes to the opticoat fiesta by 3.6 seconds to SS6, new turkey the Honda hits back though beating the new kids on the streets by 0.7 Sullins continues his good form too pushing hard on medium kumos to be 3rd quickest over the 13Ks and 2 in front of Reeves who is simply trying to stay in the game it's a game that's been made easier for Scott Pitter by preserving tyres everybody else I think we're in front to back but we need to save some tyres this afternoon particularly if it starts to rain we didn't change them we would have lost plenty of time in that last one just cruising down the hills first one was surprising we were really gentle but only 0.3 behind the earlice we'd gone alright thanks for new turkey though Evans is a stage winner we were nearly 8 seconds faster so new tyres in the front guaranteed but only just faster than Steve McKenzie he not only won his first ARC stage but is now leading his first ARC heat first stage win that's really good to get under a belt I didn't think I was doing anything special through that stage just being nice and easy on the tyres hitting the apex and just keeping it clean unfortunately Alan Rowe wasn't keeping things clean through SS6 the day co-focus sporting more than a few car park scratches I sure have mate, yeah it was a bit of good luck more than good management I think to get out of it that's for sure just into it like a 5 right or fairly tight anyone it was gravel right across the road not on a no grip and just couldn't pull it up wheel alignment still good it felt like it would have ripped a rear wheel off that hit that hard but anyway Tom Ryan put Guy Tyler on notice that the junior challenge was not going unchallenged with a replacement diff in the Altezza Ryan was chasing down the Renault that was languishing with gremlins in the electrics young Ryan's biggest challenge might have been the handbrake in the co-driver's seat it was horrible less than enthusiastic about overtaking the slow competitor back on the road the quickest junior finishes the first morning stages ahead of Tony Moore in the R1 Fiesta and another Victorian Graham Redcliff who stepped up from the state competition for the final round of the national series yeah that's right so we're not going to win the event but we're definitely out there having as much fun as we can and that includes this moment in SS6 in the competition Ashley James is taking things a step further next year his old championship winning Corolla from 1999 is being used to getting some ready for the 2015 ARC championship season we've got a Volkswagen V2 car and actually some of the setup changes we've made on the Toyota we made those changes with an eye on where we're going with the Volkswagen and I'm really looking forward to actually having a steer of that car now it's going to be awesome and then we'll see what happens after the morning break with Ree struggling for handling and like better conserving his tyres the OptiCode pilot powers the Fiesta through a Bunyup Reverse half a second a kilometre faster than Eli Evans in the Honda if there were no issues for the tank former Honda through 7 then the same couldn't be said for SS8 I'll ask Trigga to see if we've got anything in it Eli's last chance to win a heat in 2014 evaporated with the water and a leaking engine head gasket a fourth stage win for the Mackenzie brothers this time with Brendan Reeve 9 seconds behind struggling with tyres the stage that we did after the last service was really really loose and more of a granite sand surface and then the last one was as well but we had to take it easy on the first one to make sure the tyres got through the second then we come back with quite a good amount of grip so like we should have pushed harder on the first stage you know but anyway you win some you lose some Adrian Coppin finally beats Tony Sullins in a stage he and Tim Batten count themselves lucky after taking a stick through the radiator when we pulled up and I pulled it out luckily for us it didn't actually start leaking coolant so I was a bit concerned, had a few times there but I kept checking the temp gauge on the dash and we're quite lucky with our cars because they start flashing red when things get hot and they start shutting the computer systems down so we just kept pressing on With a one minute advantage over his team Tony Sullins is playing the conservative car not totally confident of his place notes The last stage for instance the car I don't know maybe had the wrong tyres on had hards, had mediums instead and just not really confident in the notes time show we got beaten He can't catch Scott Petter who's balancing the preservation of his tyres against a rally win and he's replaced this heat behind Steve McKenzie I'm pretty comfortable doing it I'm just hitting Apex getting good traction I'm surprised we're out in front They feel credit for McKenzie they're driving that car very very well I've seen more tyres but I know how fast I'm going and he's doing a very very good job so we just need to stay in second and the championships and that championship will be weighed out right after the break Scott Petter comes out firing for the repeat stages and the championship in the East Coast Bullbars ARC for 2014 what a difference four new kumos make Brendan Reeves is second 2.9 behind keeping the pressure on both championship contenders in front of Steve McKenzie to see heat win McKenzie is bumped back to fourth in stage through the repeat of New Turkey Tony Sullen's gaining confidence in the Citroen and his notes the short left four and a half hug into short right five left four and a half plus Reeves and Petter are in a race of their own this stage belongs to the Mazda but by just 0.7 no problems for Alan Rowe through the repeat run he's consolidating another wise good weekend lifting to 15 heat with just two follow stages remaining there is no time for Scott Petter to relax with Brendan Reeves breathing down his neck he can't take his eye off the board we've actually had a few minor minor minor moments where Bakar's just gone off the line those last couple of stages so I need to get back and concentrate and just make sure that we drive racing lines again this year for Brendan Reeves who after a stellar start to the season has plenty to be proud of considering the difference in age and experience of his adversary for us it's been a big challenge actually we started the year off really well but we were still having issues we won the second round as well but bit by default Scott had problems he was winning and then he won the next couple costs we had awesome pace winning the first stage for six seconds and then the camshaft broke so it could have been but it's still ain't over yet we've got three stages and I'm loving it's coming down to a wire I'd just like to be in Scott's boots not mine last year was very much a learning year for the car and for us first year in a frontal drive car and we've got the car right long-time guy's got a fantastic job getting the car right and then Dale and I are in sync now and everything's just pretty easy for Mac Dalton this is an almost surreal final service of the year he's been watching Scott Petter for two decades I'm really sort of here I'm a bit on edge to tell you the truth I just want him to do it really badly so how long have you been part of that Petter's team? a fair while we've always had the escorts and basically all the way through most years with them it's been a fair while that's the last time he's heading out in this championship yeah come back a champion Scott Petter gives away four seconds to Steve McKenzie for the heat win his focus firmly on the big prize stage 11, Bunya Preverse is a win for Brendan Reeves as is the final forest stage to Raga Reverse amazingly after 18 kilometres the man who has chased the championship title all year only to fall short of the 11th hour the young man who has just revealed his hand as a future ARC champion seven seconds shy of this pair is the Wilkinshire performance Renault Clio, aboard Scott Petter and Dale Moskert close to claiming the 2014 title back at Lardner Park it's almost a formality SS13 is a repeat of the Hummer Hall Power Stage nothing short of disaster will change the outcome of this exciting moment in front of family and friends what a stressful event yeah it has been a long time coming you know a lot of thanks to a lot of people which too many to mention but over a long career and the Wilkinshire guys done a fantastic job this year and Dale's awesome and yeah it's been a great weekend for us it didn't start well but we managed to tie things really well and we won the rally as well which is just cherry on top a rally win to Scott Petter but the final heat goes to Steve McKenzie Tony Sullen's a well-deserved third in heat ahead of teammate Adrian Coppin with Brendan Reeves rounding out the fastest five for the day Tom Ryan collects the bounty for the junior challenge winning $5,000 cash 20 Kumo Tires and plenty of incentives to enter for next season Kumo's spirit of the rally award goes to Edward Bowes for his excellence in photography over the last two decades this his 150th ARC event not quite that many for Scott Petter who grabs the biggest bag of points this weekend ahead of a well-deserved Tony Sullen's Brendan Reeves is third for the final round of the championship here in Victoria ahead of Adrian Coppin and Alan Rowe 44 points the final margin between Petter and Reeves for the title and despite her last-minute lunge from an always-improving Tony Sullen's Adrian Coppin holds on for third in the championship with Alan Rowe fifth the accolades though must go to a man who's had two dreams one, an Australian rally championship that for so many years has eluded him the other guiding and nurturing the very championship he's just conquered like the roads of the rally this weekend both dreams have been tough to travel but full of obstacles requiring the utmost determination and grit a deserving champion that's it for the 2014 season we hope you've enjoyed the East Coast Bullbars Australian rally championship join us again in 2015 flag drops for another year of competition in the sport that is uncompromising, addictive and often unforgiving we hope you can join us then in the meantime as always I'm Greg Rust, Wife and Out