A Whickham navigator recently took part in a Rally Scholarship shoot-out for young navigators. Alex Metcalfe did extremely well in the Hero ERA Bob Rutherford Historic Rally Scholarship, finishing an excellent very close second place. As a prize Alex will recieve a free entry into the 2024 Novice Trial.
The shoot-out took place at the HERO premises at Bicester Heritage Centre, where five scholarship finalists were competing to win full training and funding to navigate for expert drivers in four 2024 HERO-ERA rallies, whilst also attending selected Motorsport UK Academy courses.
The finalists all impressed the expert rally panel of Guy Woodcock, Will Rutherford, Andy Pullan, Seren Whyte and Tony Jardine after they were put through rigorous tests, including a full day of monitored training designed to bring out the potential star navigator in each of them.
Navigation of speed tests and average speed regularities were attempted whilst being driven in HERO-ERA Arrive & Drive rally cars. The finalists then competed in a map plotting exercise after they had been through general navigation and media training which included a TV style interview.
L-R: Alex Metcalfe, Ralph Bohannon, Danielle Poole, Joseph Barnabus, Daisy Walker.
Alex believes the experience will really benefit his future rallying career: “I think it was quite successful for me out on the road, I was a few seconds out on the regularity and wasn’t perfect as I don’t really have much regularity experience, but we learned so much today. I’m very happy that I’ve managed to win the free entry on the Novice Trial 2024, that is very valuable as it will help take my career forward.”
The eventual winner was Danielle Poole from Exmouth. The youngest of the finalists, Danielle ran in the course opening car on the Exmouth Memorial Road Rally, helps maintain her and her Dad’s Super 16 Vauxhall Corsa rally car and wants to take navigation to a professional level.
Words and pictures with thanks to HERO-ERA. For more information on the Bob Rutherford Historic Rally Scholarship visit their website
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