Training Report Vol.1 - Arctic Lapland Rally / Rally Sweden
To start the 2017 season Takamoto Katsuta and Hiroki Arai came back to Finland after 3 months break in Japan. They started the training with ice/snow driving test toward their first rally in 2017; Arctic Lapland Rally, the first round of Finnish Rally Championship. The number of the rallies they will participate in this year increased to 14 while it was only 8 in 2016. Their target of this year is to get as much experience as possible through competitions, and also to improve physically and mentally so that they can keep concentration during long and tough rallies. Their aim is to get closer to a level of European top drivers in the same class by the end of the year.
TRAINING
Katsuta started to work with a new co-driver this year, a Finnish experienced co-driver, Marko Salminen. The new pair's first challenge was to get to know each other and to get used to make pacenotes together. Since early January, they spent their time together by doing physical training and pacenote training day after day. Their cooperation went very well already before the first rally.
Arai's co-driver this year is Glenn Macneall from Australia. They have been working together since last spring so the pair has already a good chemistry and very stable.
Markko Martin, a former WRC driver joined the test one day and help the drivers giving valuable advices on driving and car settings. Both Katsuta and Arai learned a lot and prepared for the weekend rally.
Rally Report
RESULT
Hiroki Arai/Glenn Macneall 10th (Ford Fiesta R5) 2:14:07.7
Takamoto Katsuta/Marko Salminen 20th (Ford Fiesta R5) 2:34:52.4
Arctic Lapland Rally is a traditional Finnish rally based in Rovaniemi, northern Finland. With a large part of the route within the Arctic Circle, temperatures have been known to dip as low as minus 35 degrees centigrade in the past. On this occasion though, it was just below zero degrees: providing optimal snow conditions for Katsuta and Arai to continue learning this extremely specialized surface, each driving a Ford Fiesta R5.
Both drivers finished all 10 stages of the rally, although Katsuta/Salminen lost 18 minutes stuck in a snow bank on the opening day. He eventually got back on the road and finished 20th overall after two intense days of competition. Hiroki/Macneall enjoyed a clean run until the very last stage, ending up 10th after he also got stuck in a snow bank and lost five minutes.
WRC - Rally Sweden
RESULT
Hiroki Arai/Glenn Macneall WRC2 Class 7th (Ford Fiesta R5) 2:52:01.6
Takamoto Katsuta/Marko Salminen WRC2 Class 9th (Ford Fiesta R5) 2:58:42.1
Rally Sweden is a highly-specialized snow rally known with very high speed. It provided the young Japanese drivers with a chance not only to practise their driving skills and pacenotes, but also to acclimatise to the fatigue and concentration needed to master a top-level world event.
In Sweden, they drove on wider world championship specification snow tyres, rather than the narrow tyres they used two weeks ago at Arctic Lapland Rally. As a result they had to learn to judge the grip that was available all over again, which meant that on occasions they got closer to the snow banks that they had reckoned for. The other challenges posed by the tricky Rally Sweden route included avoiding punctures and making sure that the studs stayed within the tyres. Both drivers made some mistakes, but they got to the end of one of the most demanding rallies they have ever faced with plenty of valuable lessons learned for the future. Against some of the best drivers in this category in the world, Arai finished seventh in class while Katsuta was ninth.
Hiroki Arai
During Arctic Lapland Rally I tried set-up changes at each service, and my feeling to the car became better and better. It was very useful for Rally Sweden as well. In Rally Sweden I tried various driving styles and thorough these trials I could analyze what worked well and what didn’t work well from the stage times and my feeling. It was a difficult rally and things didn't go as I planned but it was still encouraging that some of my stage times were close with top drivers' in the same class. Although I did make quite a few mistakes, I could learn what I should focus on and what I should improve from those mistakes.
Comment from Chief instructor, Jouni Ampuja
The results of Arctic Lapland Rally on paper did not reflect their real performance. Being unfamiliar with these complex conditions, both drivers did extremely well against some strong rivals, setting top five stage times. We were happy that they could get confidence and good experience through the rally. In Rally Sweden, they had many punctures and small mistakes but they were inevitable as their experience level is still low. The most positive things were the drivers’ progress on their speed when everything was working well. This long and tough rally taught our young drivers to keep focused even in these very difficult and tiring conditions. For further improvement, Katsuta should concentrate more on the pacenotes making and Arai should focus more on constant driving. We will continue supporting them with maximum effort for them to overcome those challenges.
Takamoto Katsuta
On the Day2 of Arctic Lapland Rally, my starting order was 41st due to my time loss on Day1. It means I had to drive in quite challenging condition with deep ruts and the roads after snow swept away. It gave me a good lesson for how to manage those conditions. In Rally Sweden, I realized once again the importance of pacenotes as my pacenotes weren't perfect and it affected my driving. But I enjoyed the rally, especially the jumps. Sweden was my second WRC event, so I felt a bit more comfortable than the first time I drove at WRC Rally Finland last year and was able to control myself better with broader view.