Hood River,
Oregon, Sunday May 4th. With
Ken Block and Antoine L’Estage not competing at this year’s Oregon Trail Rally
it was left to Subaru Rally Teammates David Higgins and Travis Pastrana to
fight for the victory. Of course we will
never really know if team orders factored over the 3 day rally, but in the end
2 punctures on Pastrana’s Subaru on the penultimate stage of the rally, the
rocky ‘Husky South” sealed the deal for
Higgins.
Day one of the
rally would begin at Portland International Raceway with four short stages run
on a mixed surface of Tarmac, Gravel and some grass thrown in for good measure.
Pastrana’s NASCAR experience would give him the edge on Higgins as he led the
Manxman by a mere 4 seconds heading into the overnight halt.
Day two would
see the teams head west to Dufur, dry conditions prevailed in the normally wet northwest.
Privateer Adam Yeoman and co driver
Jordan Schulze have been steadily climbing up the Rally America leader in the
past few years was designated to run first on the road to balance out any dust
advantage between the much quicker Higgins and Pastrana.
But for Higgins
dust would be the least of his issues, as he attacked hard on the first pass of
the longest stage of the Rally SS6 “Big Boyd” a little over a mile into the
stage Higgins would pick up a rear puncture. Rather than stopping to change the
wheel, David and Craig decided to push on over the relatively fast smooth stage.
As Higgins stopped the clock on SS6, despite
a hard push throughout the stage on three tires, he would drop 54 seconds to
Pastrana, but they still managed to hold second place overall by 9 seconds over
Adam Yeoman.

Over the final
stages on day two David Higgins would set out to reel in his Subaru teammate
Pastrana, David and co driver Craig Drew would post the fastest times on 7 of
the 8 stages to close to within 39 seconds of Travis heading into the overnight
halt. Adam Yeoman was holding 3rd
overall.
In SP Class Dillon
Van Way was holding off defending SP champion David Sterckx, with Laughlin O’Sullivan
rounding out the top three.
We did expect a
solid battle in 2WD with the debut of the Ford Racing Fiesta ST, going head to
head with Championship rivals Scion Racing, but it was a 20 year old BMW M3 in
the very capable hands of Ramana Legemann that was stealing the show. Steering with the rear throughout most of the
fast flowing stages Ramana and his co-driver the
equally talented Nathalie Richard were leaving the factory supported cars in
the dust.
Day 3, Higgins had
the big push in early stages putting the pressure on Pastrana in an effort to
narrow the gap. After first loop of three stages, Higgins erased 30 seconds off
Pastrana’s lead, bring Travis to within just 9 seconds. Yeoman was still
hanging onto third but was over 5 minutes back off Pastrana. SP Class, Dillon Van Way was in a heated battle with David Sterckx for the overall lead. In 2WD Andrew Comrie-Picard was starting to cut into Lagemann’s lead as the tighter technical stages better suited the nimble Fiesta. After and impressive showing at 100AW before he eventually ran aground Will Hudson was again on an impressive pace holding third behind ACP.
As the drivers
lined up at the start of SS17, “Husky North” which was the penultimate stage of
the rally.
David Higgins
was now just 6 seconds off Pastrana, with about 13 stage miles to the final
time control it was questionable if Pastrana could keep Higgins at bay.
Although Travis has gotten back up to speed quickly on his return to rally he
is still several seconds a mile off Higgins pace. If Higgins were driving at the pace he would
if he were in the heat of battle with Ken Block and Antoine L’Estage, he would
have easily overhauled Travis.
But unfortunately
we will have to wait until another day to see how far Travis has come when
victory is within grasp, Pastrana and co-driver Chrissy Beavis would suffer two
punctures on SS17. With a significant
gap back to Yeoman in third, Travis would transit through the stage in an effort
to salvage second.
For Higgins it
was just a matter of getting through the final stage of the rally to collect his
fourth consecutive Oregon Trail Rally win. “I just wish Pastrana didn’t get his
puncture so we can see the real times,” said Higgins. “It would have been
close, at least we could afford to cut back on the last stage because we had
nothing left. It was so slick out there with the rain coming down. It was an
awesome battle, fantastic for Subaru to sweep the podium.”
The 2014 Oregon Trail Rally had all the makings of a victory for Pastrana on this his second event with Subaru
since his return from NASCAR, but he would have to be content with his second podium
finish in so many events. Pastrana added, “It was such an awesome rally, We had
some fortune to get the lead, but Higgins chipped away at it. We learned so
much here and we are a lot closer than we were the first race. I can’t wait for
the next round.” It very well maybe Maine or Mt Washington before we see Travis
back in stage Rally competition as he heads down under with his Nitro Circus
crew this month.
Dillon Van Way
was also dealt a cruel blow on the penultimate stage; he would sustain ball
joint damage therefore turning over his lead to David Sterckx who was tight on
his heels throughout day three. Dillon was able to struggle through the final
stage to salvage second over Lauchlin O’Sullivan, another 1,2,3, for Subaru.
Much to the delight of rear wheel drive rally fans, Ramana Lagemann and Nathalie Richard who grabbed the lead in 2WD from the start of the rally, and somehow managed to hold off a late charge from Andrew Comrie-Picard in the closing stages eventually claimed the overall victory in 2WD. “It always feels good to come back rallying,” exclaimed Lagemann. “This was a completely new car, experience and co-driver for me [referring to 2wd Rally]. We came here to have fun, but we didn’t know if we had the capability to win. This is totally unexpected.”
Higgins’
overall win extends Subaru’s first place position in the manufactures battle,
with a very limited schedule from Ford Racings Ken Block; it seems that Subaru
are well on their way to another Championship. With Antoine L’Estage also uncertain
for the balance of the 2014 RA campaign, and Pastrana only contesting 6 of the
8 events it seems that Higgins is also well on his way to yet another title. Despite
what seems a sure bet for Higgins to repeat as Champion, it will not take away
anything from the action on the stages in the remaining 5 rounds.
SP Championship
and David Sterckx added to Subaru’s points lead in the Super Production
manufacturers’ standings. Andrew Comrie-Picard’s podium finish breaks the 2WD
manufacturers’ first place tie with Scion, and Honda adds more points to their
B-SPEC lead.
All of the
Oregon Trail Rally drama is scheduled to be broadcast on the NBC Sports Network
on June 1, 2014 at 6pm ET/3pm PT.
Next up is the STPR in Wellsboro,
Pennsylvania May 30-31. We can expect an all out battle between Ken Block and
Higgins on the fast twisty and always trying stages in Wellsboro. STPR will be
the second of two Rally America events that Ken Block will contest in 2014.
Words: Neil McDaid
Photos; Neil McDaid, Rhianon Gelsomino/Instagram
Words: Neil McDaid
Photos; Neil McDaid, Rhianon Gelsomino/Instagram