Aberdovey-based rally driver Tom Cave took a dominant win on this weekend's Mid Wales Stages for the second year running, at the wheel of his new-for-2012, Trefeddian Hotel-supported Subaru Impreza. Cave and co-driver Craig Parry won every stage on the one-day event to reach the finish ramp with a winning margin of almost a minute, a year on from his first win on the event.
The Mid Wales marked the second outing for the Impreza, the first the previous day when Tom and Craig tackled the Malcolm Wilson Rally, round two of the BTRDA series, However, an early driveshaft failure cut that event short.
The Davies Motorsport Services technicians changed all of the car's 'shafts overnight as a precaution, as well as making several set-up changes to Tom's specification, based on his feeling on the northern event and it clearly paid off.
Tom laid out his stall early, taking the win on the first stage of the event by 13 seconds. Immediately establishing a good feeling in the car and finding the right rhythm and pace, he went on to win each of the six stages that formed the event, based in Newtown and close to Tom's Aberdovey home.
Commenting at the end of the event, Tom said; "I'm really happy to get this result, back-to-back with our win on the event last year. It was also very gratifying to get the first win for the new car on only its second event.
"I realised we had a good pace with the car after the first stage - we won by 13 seconds and I knew that all we needed to do was maintain the pace without taking any silly risks and have a good, clean rally.
"We took things a bit steadier on the second stage and only won that by two seconds but we were able to manage our pace to ensure that we stayed at the front without over-driving the car.
"We made quite a few changes overnight, not least of which was changing all the driveshafts, in case we'd got a bad batch. We also made changes to the set-up and I think we've now got a very good setting for fast gravel events.
"The car felt fantastic. We've made a lot of changes to it since last year and it's really paid off. I felt like I drove the best I have for at least a year today and we know that there's still plenty more to come from the car, so I'm really excited about this season."
Tom's next event will see him switch from four to two wheel-drive, as he tackles the Bulldog Rally, the second round of the British Rally Championship in his new Citroen DS3 R3T. His car has now arrived from the Citroen Sport factory in France and following a pre-event test, he and Craig will continue their campaign in the all-2WD BRC.
