Motor Rally: Leong Onn takes early lead with champ Karamjit trailing
NST, 30/3/2008

THE first day of the 2008 Malaysian Rally Championship (MRC) ended with reigning champion Karamjit Singh in an unfamiliar position -- chasing leader Lim Leong Onn of the Perodua M5 Racing Team.

Although the Perodua M5 Racing Team only confirmed their entry at the eleventh hour and did not have any off-season development or testing work, it was clear that Lim's four-wheel drive Perodua Viva Turbo and the two Myvi the team campaigned last year were still competitive.

"The thing that really slowed me down is the poor braking of the car. The pedals are spongy and lacked feel. I lost a lot of time from early braking," said Karamjit.

Racing in a rented car that came with no spares forced him to take a more conservative approach.

He was not the only one to take the cautious approach. Even those who came prepared with an ample stock of spares echoed Karamjit because the stages in Bahau are quite rough and unforgiving.

The heavy overnight downpour deepened some ruts while standing water masked some of the other severe surface irregularities.

As Karamjit struggled to clock good times, Team Perodua M5's Lim established himself as the man to beat and led team Pennzoil's Gunaseelan Rajoo by a comfortable margin early on the first day and maintained his pace to hold on to his top position on the timesheet.

Karamjit was not the only driver to switch cars. Gunaseelan chose not to attack the stages in their two-wheel drive Gen2 but instead used an older car from their stable, a 4WD Proton Putra coupe. The decision paid off.

"The fact is, we had little chance of grabbing an overall win with a two- wheel drive car so we took the risk of using an older machine in the hope that the extra traction of the all-wheel drive system will give us an edge," said Gunaseelan, who starts Leg Two today in second.

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