REGIONAL FIRE & SECURITY SAFARI ON HORIZON

After a break of more than two months, competitors in the Barbados Rally Club’s (BRC) Mud Dogs Safari Championship are starting preparations for the Regional Fire & Security September Safari, slated for Sunday, September 5 . . . and, with rain now a regular feature of the island’s weather pattern, a tough event is anticipated.
September’s event is the fourth of five rounds in the 2010 season – the final will be the Nassco October Safari – and, with the introduction of a dropped-score rule for the first time, the Championship is still wide open. While the results of the Shelbury Construction June Safari might appear to have given some crews a useful advantage, dropping the lowest score to date not only tightens up the margins, but also shuffles the order.
While the Navigator and Driver standings are led by Ryan Corbin and Dustin Edwards, whether or not you take into account the dropped score, the complexion of the list behind each changes significantly, once you do drop the low score, with a major shake-up of the top 10.
In the Navigator standings, for instance, Corbin’s lead of 18 points over Derek Edwards becomes merely a two-point advantage over Neil Barnard, while the spread of points across the top 10 is cut from 70 to just 18. Conversely, last year’s Champion Navigator and Driver Robert Warren and Darrin White drop a few places down the order, once the dropped score is taken into account.
There is a similar effect in the Novice Championship: while the leading Navigators and Drivers all remain the same, the spread across the top three is cut by around half in each case. Navigator Andre Murrell’s lead over Gary Mendes comes down from 16 to four points, while Driver Ben Norris’s advantage over Adrian Sinckler is reduced by two.
Route setters for the season’s penultimate Safari are Dominic Brooker and Stephen Dear, winners of the Armag March Safari last year and runner-up Navigator and Driver respectively in the 2009 Mud Dogs Safari Championship; they have been helped by Peter Bradshaw, while the re-checkers are Leslie Alleyne and Chris Oneal. The navigation will be a mixture of the BRC and tulip systems.
The first crew will leave the start at Belle, St Michael, at 8.01am on September 5 for the first of two routes; the stopover will be at Chapel Plantation, St Philip, with the finish – scheduled for approximately 5.00pm – at the Barbados Clay Target Shooting Association (BCTSA) Club House at Searles, Christ Church.
Entries for the Regional Fire & Security September Safari are now open at Motorsport Services, Haggatt Hall, St Michael, and will close at 2.00pm next Tuesday (August 31); the Briefing Meeting will be held at 7.00pm the same evening at the BCTSA Club House.

Mud Dogs BRC Safari Championship
Positions after round 3
Navigators
1st Ryan Corbin (Blockman/SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Crane & Equipment Toyota Hilux), 178 points
2nd Derek Edwards (SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Joe Brooker's Building Toyota Hilux), 160pts
3rd Wayne Clarke (Suzuki Samurai), 158pts
4th Kirk Watkins (Axis Inc Isuzu D-max), 150pts
5th Robert Warren (Flyin’ Fish/Lucky Locks Nissan Frontier), 138pts
6th equal Neil Barnard (Gale’s Agro Products/redlinefuels.com Ford Ranger & Huzier/Mahindra Motorsports/redlinefuels.com Mahindra Pik-Up) & Warren Gollop (Mitsubishi Pajero), 132pts
8th Renata Roett (Toyota Hilux), 120pts
9th Stephen Dear (SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Next Generation Electrical/Joe Brooker's Building Toyota Hilux), 118pts
10th equal Jeremy Croney (Suzuki Samurai & Toyota Hilux) & Andre Murrell (Suzuki Samurai), 108pts
etc
Novice Navigators
1st Murrell, 108pts – equal 10th overall
2nd Gary Mendes (LG Trading/Lunatics Inc Mitsubishi Pajero iO), 92pts
3rd Winston Drakes (Marks Auto Spares/Champion Auto Wrecker Service Suzuki Samurai), 57pts
etc

Drivers
1st Dustin Edwards (Blockman/SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Crane & Equipment Toyota Hilux), 178pts
2nd Damian Brooker (SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Joe Brooker's Building Toyota Hilux), 160pts
3rd Chris Armstrong (Suzuki Samurai), 158pts
4th Darrin White (Flyin’ Fish/Lucky Locks Nissan Frontier), 138pts
5th equal Brett Barber (Mitsubishi Pajero) & Barry Gale (Gale’s Agro Products/redlinefuels.com Ford Ranger & Huzier/Mahindra Motorsports/redlinefuels.com Mahindra Pik-Up), 132pts
7th Ben Norris (Pitbull Energy Drink/ACE Engineering Land Rover Discovery), 122pts
8th Edson Arthur (Toyota Hilux), 120pts
9th Dominic Brooker (SDRR Hydraulic & Industrial Spares/Next Generation Electrical/Joe Brooker's Building Toyota Hilux), 118pts
10th Gregory Dickenson (Toyota Hilux), 116pts
etc
Novice Drivers
1st Norris, 122pts – 7th overall
2nd Adrian Sinckler (Suzuki Samurai), 108pts
3rd Luke Gittens (LG Trading/Lunatics Inc Mitsubishi Pajero iO), 92pts
etc

BRC Mud Dogs Safari Championship
Remaining events:
Sep 5 - Regional Fire & Security September Safari
Oct 17 - Nassco October Safari

For further media information, robin@bradfax.com