When you exit a rally car and find bushes caught in its panels, you know you’ve gone close to the edge.
Rotorua driver Sloan Cox tested his car at an Otago Rally shakedown in Dunedin yesterday and took me and some bush along for the ride.
More than 130 crews are in Dunedin for the three-day rally, the first round of the national series, which begins in the Octagon at 5pm today, with the first car to be flagged away at 6.15pm.
Waiting for the marshall to count us down to a start, the Mitsubishi Evo X hums patiently.The only advice Cox gave me as we waited for our turn to spray gravel across Whare Flat was to avoid grabbing the locking mechanism on the safety belt.
The consequences of accidentally opening the mechanism as we screamed along could be dire, he said.
"It’s got awesome power," Cox says.
The marshall puts an open hand in front of the windscreen and as his fingers starts to disappear, Cox begins to rev the engine.
The roar of the engine invokes delusions of being Goose in the movie Top Gun, seated in a fighter jet about to leave an aircraft carrier.
On the signal to go, Cox drops the clutch, throwing me firmly back in the seat and back to reality.
He swings on the steering wheel and slams the gears, throwing the car into a hug with a corner, tighter than a mother and child reuniting.
The loving comparisons get crushed as the turbocharged car rips greenery from the clutches of Mother Nature.
The pressure on the body from the ride is immense, leaving my lower back in need of a retread.
"A 40km stage is hard on your body but once you start, you can’t stop. It’s such a cool feeling," Cox says.
He is no stranger to podium finishes, or the Otago Rally, and keeps returning because he loves Otago’s "fast and scary" roads.
Rally spokesman Roger Oakley said 132 crews had come from around New Zealand and across the world for the opening round of the New Zealand Rally Championship and associated event the International Classic Rally for veteran, two-wheel-drive cars.
The rain yesterday was ideal for suppressing dust before forecast fine weather arrives. The rally cars competing cost between $10,000 and $250,000 each and can reach speeds up to 200kmh.
Natalie Brown (26) won an Otago Daily Times competition to be a co-driver yesterday.
Classic Rally driver Mark Laughton drove the University of Otago administrator in his Hillman Avenger.
The best bit of the "amazing" experience was when Laughton got the car, powered by a V8 Rover engine, "airborne" at the end of the run, she said.
