Ardeca Ypres Rally, Day One - 23/06/23
Words and Images by Mitcham Media
Thursday nights shakedown acted as the perfect appetiser for the tarmac tearing chaos of the 2023 Ardeca Ypres Rally.
Our morning started off with a nip into town for coffee, stage side supplies and a wander round the service park to see some of the final preparation before first time control.
Ypres has to be one of the most aesthetically pleasing service parks with the perfectly restored architecture surrounding the tents. In true European style there was a plethora of cafe’s with the smell of fresh coffee and pastries wafting out into the street, it would be rude not to nip in.
Full of coffee and croissants, and with crates of Juplier, bread, cheese and cured meats in cool boxes we were ready to head out to stage one.
After trekking through the potato fields to find a good spot we were less than ten cars into the stage before it was canceled due to an off (fortunately no one was injured). Fortunately, Ypres is a compressed rally with most of the stages being within a 20 minute drive of each other, so after a dash back to the car we weren’t long from the next viewing spot.
We laid out our chairs near a hairpin left with a long straight either side, and it was the perfect spot to get involved in the action as a Rally3 Renault overshot the hairpin and slid into the ditch. Within seconds 30 plus spectators swarmed the stage with tow ropes to pull the car out the ditch and get it back into the event.
Our last stage of the day started at dusk which gave a glorious golden glow as the fastest cars came through, We could see them popping out round a fast right hander over a crest before screaming down a long straight into a 90 left into long 90 right. Plenty of opportunity to see limiter bashing and potential overshoots at the junction.
Chris Ingram in his Polo Rally2 put on a good show, completely missing the braking zone before locking up and sliding straight through the fence having to pull the hand brake and spin himself round back onto stage.
With the sun setting and the light fading quickly it wasn’t long before we saw cars coming through with full lamp pods cutting through the darkness.
With the low light it was epic to see the orange glow of an anti-lag ravaged exhausts and frying pan brake disks.
Night stages will never get boring with the assault on the senses of the blinding light pods and screaming engine noise.
The day closed out with a night service before cars were taken into parc ferme overnight. The centre of Ypres was buzzing with music, beer and tools flying around. For some teams a long night was ahead of them repairing damage from day one including a car which had rolled and a team of 7 people were setting to with hammers and mole grips bending panels and door shuts so they wouldn’t foul.
Check out a highlight reel from the night service here on youtube: https://youtu.be/JX4EB1c81mg
Keep an eye out for the next post covering the final day of the rally, but for now check out the rest of the images below.
