Ben Barker is still the reigning king of the Bega Valley Rally.
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The defending champion held on to his crown by almost two-and-a-half minutes over the Thomas Dermody-driven Ford RS1800.
The Bega driver posted the best time in four of the six stages on Sunday after blitzing through his home rounds on Bega’s Shire Roads Saturday afternoon.
Current NSW Champion Bryan Van Eck had to settle for third in his Toyota Altezza, finishing just 56 seconds back from the runner-up.
Australian Rally Champion Nathan Quinn – with Bega’s own Alexander Eadie in the navigator seat – suffered an unfortunate engine blowout on stage 10.
The pair had been running third.
Despite the upset, Quinn said he was delighted to take part.
“I’m going to say it...Bega shire stages are the best in the Southern Hemisphere,” he said on social media.
“We were only about 600m into the stage when the motor blew,” Eadie said. “It was pretty unlucky, but nonetheless [the weekend] was very enjoyable.”
It was something of an experience for the 16-year-old, who served as navigator for the ARC champion.
“Honestly, I’m speechless, it was an unbelievable experience.”
Meanwhile, Van Eck considered the Bega Valley Rally his spiritual “home track I guess you could say.”, going on to say that his parents lived in Cobargo for about 25 years.
Van Eck said the Valley Rally was one of few he would contest this year.
“These are the very best roads in Australia to compete on,” he said. “I won’t be doing many events this year because my son is in Year 12 and the focus is elsewhere, but I made sure to be here for this, it’s the best.”
President of the Sapphire Coast Sporting Car Club, Kim Boyd contested with wife Vicki in the passenger seat and said it was incredible to see the number of entries.
There were more than 20 more competitors than last year, but the Valley Rally had outshone major rally events in both Canberra and Adelaide only a week earlier.
“To get bigger numbers than those events is pretty insane,” Mr Boyd said.”It’s a great event.”
Moruya-based navigator Maisie Place raced with driver Peter Mosely during the race, finishing 31st out of 62 cars.