PRESS RELEASE

FELDA RALLY TEAM 1, 3 LEG ONE MRC

15th August, Kota Tinggi – The Felda Rally Team is currently in first and third place after Leg One of Round Three of the Malaysian Rally Championship 2009 (MRC) which is being run concurrently with the FIA APRC MALAYSIAN RALLY 2009 (MR9).

Saladin Mazlan drove his Proton Gen2 to first place in 2hr 17min 4sec and team mate Rozali Abdullah finished third in 2hr 20min 59sec. Both cars are entered in the 4WD and P12 categories.

“We are gloriously happy,” said Saladin’s co-driver Arish Qutb Ahmad Khan. “We had a bit of trouble in SS1&2 when our brakes failed, but once they were fixed we pushed hard and got a great result,” he added.

Gunaseelan Rajoo of the GSR Pennzoil Racing Team finished second, 2min 22sec behind Saladin. He said he lost time in SS3,4 & 5 due to a technical problem with his turbo booster, but managed to correct it and make up time in the remainder of the race.

Guna said tomorrow’s leg is important for him to score points for the team. “I’ll see what the conditions are like tomorrow, if they suit me then I’ll push a little harder. We need to score Championship points, so that’s my focus,” he said.

Karamjit Singh of the Proton R3 Malaysia team who is entered in both the MRC and the APRC put his Proton Satria Neo S2000 into a ditch in SS2 and had to be towed out.

“In SS1 we stalled many times and we had to reverse many times so we lost more than a minute. Then in SS2 we were doing much better but unfortunately I clipped a corner too early and ditched the car,” Karamjit said. He and co-driver Jagdev Singh will start again tomorrow (Sunday).

Indian driver Arjun Rao finished strongly in fourth place, 3min 23 sec behind Rozali. He lost time in SS1&2 when his power steering failed but once it was fixed he managed to push his Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 6 a little harder and made up time.

In the 2WD category Hong Kong entrant Clayton Check (P11) finished in front with a time of 2hr 37min 11sec, 4min 19sec in front of Junior driver, Faidzal Alang (P10).

‘Mike’ Ariokiasamy Ratnam had a disappointing day. The timing belt on his Proton Wira snapped in SS2 and had to be towed back to the service park. He is getting new parts from Kuala Lumpur overnight and will start again tomorrow. Mike had been looking forward to a podium finish for the 2WD category, but that hope has been dashed.

The competitors are racing through the oil-palm plantations of Kota Tinggi. They will complete 16 SS over 227.70kms this weekend. Leg Two starts tomorrow morning (Sunday) at 6.30am.

Full results can be found at www.malaysianrally.com.