RALLYING - Non-starter means more heft for Whangarei event

Sidelining Rally New Zealand for 2009 means the NAC Insurance Rally of Whangarei will attract more attention nationally and internationally, organisers say.
Rally NZ said at the end of last week that the next Rally New Zealand would run in early May 2010, when the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) returned to the country.
Rally NZ CEO Paul Mallard said the decision meant the Rally of Whangarei would become the only full international rally in the country this year.
"Obviously that will mean it will be the best chance to see the top drivers coming to New Zealand."
Mallard said the event had maintained its popularity in terms of entries since it started three years ago but it was difficult to foresee what would happen this year with tougher economic conditions already affecting the sport.
"The first rally of the season is in Hawke's Bay in a couple of weeks' time and, at the moment, I have the feeling they're probably a bit down on what they were last year and I think that's common in other parts of the world at the moment," he said.
The decision of top Kiwi rally drivers Hayden Paddon and Emma Gilmour to compete in the Asia Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) will add a new dimension to the rally.
Gilmour and Paddon have contested the Whangarei event for the past three years, but it is the first time the pair will be entered as APRC competitors.
The two-day rally in June combines international, national and clubman's fields with about 70 teams expected to tackle 280km of gravel special stages.
The event is an official round of the APRC, the Vantage New Zealand Rally Championship (NZRC) and the Top Half Rally Series for clubman's entrants.
Three-time APRC champion Australian Cody Cocker will be back to defend his title with the Singapore-based Motor Image Racing Team.
Gilmour is Crocker's new teammate, both driving the latest model Subaru Impreza WRX rally cars, which they tested recently in Malaysia.
Gilmour is the first female driver to contest the Asia Pacific series, which, with the Whangarei event, has another six rallies in 2009; in New Caledonia, Queensland, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and China.
Rally NZ's Laurie Brenssell said he was in Whangarei recently, meeting event sponsors.
"We couldn't announce what was happening with Rally New Zealand at that stage ... but the spin-off for Whangarei is that the Rally of Whangarei becomes the jewel in the crown (on the national rally circuit) this year."
The decision not to hold Rally New Zealand this year was regrettable, he said, but based on good reasoning.
"At the end of the day, it was a sensible decision because it was never going to be the Rally New Zealand we were all familiar with," Brenssell said.
"And, quite frankly, we were going to be diluting the name. So it was better just not to run it so it becomes all the more valuable in 2010."