Jamaicans speed away with rally honours

KINGSTON: Doug Gore and his co-driver Mark Nelson fended off a strong challenge from Barbadians Roger Skeete and Dave Crawford to capture the Jamaica Motoring Club’s Petcom International Stages Rally on Sunday.

Driving a Mitsubishi Evolution-8, Gore and Nelson came home in one hour 17 minutes 29 seconds, to be named provisional winners, only 48 seconds ahead of Skeete and Crawford (1:18:17). The Jamaican pair of David Summerbell Jnr and Stephen Gunter finished third a further ten seconds behind, while Paul Bourne and Stuart Maloney took fourth to give the Barbadians two of the top four finishes.

The two-day rally, which contained 22 stages, included entries from Jamaica, Barbados, Britain and Japan. Gore and Nelson, the 2001 champions, led on both days, hotly pursued by Skeete and Crawford in a Ford Escort WRC. Among other overseas competitors who finished in the top ten were Barbadians Trevor Manning and James Betts, and Japanese Toshiaki Endo, who used Jamaican Colin Chambers as his navigator. Manning and Betts placed sixth, and Sean Gill capped a good meet for the Barbadians by emerging champion in the two-wheel category. A quarter of the 36-car field dropped out at the end of day one, including defending champion Jeffery Panton and Justin Moring, of Jamaica, who suffered engine trouble.