The
third round of the AORC, the MTQ
Griffith 700, was held at Griffith
NSW on 24th & 25th July
after a four year break from hosting
the race. This race would see the
return of
Les
Siviour
multiple times national production
class champion. Scrutineering took
place at the local show grounds on
Friday night with the cars left on
display for the public to wander
around and look at. 
Prologue was run on Saturday. The
course was a 20km track which had
the same terrain as the main track.
Robert Chapman and navigator Ross
Challacombe in their Extreme 4WD
Pajero finished 1st in
class & 31st outright.
Clayton Chapman and navigator Adam
McGuire in their Production 4WD
Triton also finished first in their
class and 21st outright
out of the 78 strong field of
competitors.
Sunday
was race day with teams having to
try and complete up to eight laps of
the 87km course. Only three 15min
fuel stops were allowed. Any pit
work or extra fuel stops was added
in the competitors race time, which
meant a team effort from the pit
crew and calculated fuel and pit
stops. The race start was postponed
slightly due to extremely heavy fog.
Once racing was under way the cars
left at 15sec intervals. Rob and
Ross made an early fuel stop to
clean their windscreen due to the
muddy track and close racing. They
then stopped on their third lap for
their second fuel stop and found
that their brake pads were worn out
and they had a broken front disc
rotor. These were quickly fixed by
the pit crew and they were off and
racing again. Until the sixth lap
Rob and Ross were leading Extreme
4WD class then they suffered from a
broken tie-rod end, which they
replaced on
track and were able to finish in
second place.
Clayton
and Adam after the first lap were in
seventh outright position with the
muddy track and fog working for
them. During their fourth lap they
had to change a flat tyre. When they
came in for their second fuel stop,
they went into the pits to replace
the flat spare and remove half of
the bull bar which had broken from
fatigue. The boys lost brakes in
their sixth lap so when they pitted
for the third time the pit crew
quickly mended the problem leaving
them with three brakes, however this
only lasted 20km then they when gone
again, adding to the drama of the
last lap a broken CV left them in
2WD also. However they still managed
a class win and where awarded with
the Ryan memorial award for being
the first tin top to finish.
Rob,
Ross, Clayton and Adam would like to
thank the help and support of all
their sponsors and the pit crew of
Craig Houston, Brett Huxstep, Darren
Orr and Cameron Winter. Both crews
had a great weekend of racing. It
really was an endurance test of both
driver & vehicle.
