Motorsport: Unsung stars of rally track

Those in the spare seat must make accurate and thorough pace notes to guide the driver around the course. Photo / Supplied

Those in the spare seat must make accurate and thorough pace notes to guide the driver around the course.

At last weekend's Rally New Zealand the drivers received just about all the attention and accolades at the end of each day.

Although they do indeed pilot the cars at extraordinary speeds, on narrow gravel roads where the smallest of mistakes may end in the biggest of messes, the co-driver also has a big part to play in any success.

Don't confuse going on a family trip to Takou Bay, with the wife guiding from an A3 map at 100km/h, with travelling at up to 200km/h - at times in the air - on narrow gravel roads.

Without someone sitting in the other seat, the high-profile drivers might just end up at the bottom of a cliff rather than on top of the podium.

Among the numerous jobs a co-driver has to undertake in a race, the most important is reading the pace notes back to the driver while being thrown about the car like a ball bearing in a tin can.

These pace notes are almost as important as the driver's skills and if they're wrong, or read wrong, it's all over, rover. On a recce drive, where the cars are not allowed to go faster than 80km/h, the driver calls out section information including how tight the corners are, rises and falls in the road, dangers, obstacles, landmarks and so on. At the same time the co-driver is furiously scribbling down these observations in a type of shorthand.

While teams' notes may vary a little in their shorthand, in general they all have the same feel.

The skill of making notes is important when trying to equate what the road will look like at 160km/h instead of 80km/h.

When trundling along at road speed, the co-driver and driver are trying to picture what it's going to be like on the day of the rally.

The observations of road shape and condition are very detailed. On average, a page is filled out for each kilometre travelled. On a long stage it would almost equate to a book.

The co-drivers can't really compare notes to save time as each set is individual and caters for that particular driver.

Don't for a moment be under the illusion that once the pair pull back into the service area the job's done. For every hour spent writing the notes on the road, it takes another hour to write them up in the evening to get ready for the race, because they have to legible at race pace.

Once racing is under way, you might hear a co-driver call out: "Start, 30, left over crest into short four right plus opens 60, crest and six right plus and don't cut short six left minus. Sixty, line into two right minus over a bump tightens to hairpin over ditch."

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This is what he's saying in layman's terms: "Start moving and drive 30m, then keep left over a crest of a hill into a fast fourth-gear right-hand corner. Then accelerate for 60m to the next crest, then stay in the middle of the road for a sixth-gear left-hand corner at half throttle. Drive 60m, keep to left-hand side of the road for a second-gear right-hand corner, which tightens badly over a bump. At the same time, brake for a hairpin over a drainage ditch."

Don't be fooled into thinking that's all the co-driver has to do.

Another important job for a co-driver is time-keeping. If a car arrives at a time-control point too early or too late, the penalties are almost draconian. Good time-keeping is critical; crews have made mistakes that have cost them wins.

Another role is to keep everything nice and calm both in and out of the car. If he feels the driver is getting a little heated, he must be able to defuse the situation and keep the pressure at a minimum.

The reason the co-driver sits lower than the driver in the car is not so he can't see what's going on out the windscreen but to keep the centre of gravity of the car as low as possible.