Davies the Dragon takes on the World
West Wales rally star Kevin Davies will fulfil a lifelong dream next month, as the 20 year old from Llanfihangel-ar-Arth contests Wales Rally GB, Britain's round of the FIA World Rally Championship. After dominating the Silkolene 1400 National Rally Championship 'A5' class this season with six wins from six starts, Davies now faces his toughest task yet, in this, his first year of rallying.The Welsh youngster will contest the three day rally behind the wheel of his regular Geoff Jones Motorsport run Nissan Micra Kit Car, and regular co-driver Emyr Jones of Llandysul will also be stepping up to the world stage with Kevin. Support for the rally once more comes from season long backers EXL Windows, KJ's Eden Tours, and David Harries & Co.For Davies, it will be no easy task to complete the event. Some 357 kilometres of the very best Welsh forests will stand between Davies and the finish of the rally in Cardiff. The youngster will run behind the likes of World Rally Champions Colin McRae, Sebastian Loeb and Marcus Gronholm as he bids to challenge for the 1400cc class honours on the rally. Yokohama and Silkolene backed Kevin's consistent form and pace should stand him in good stead for the task in hand - despite the rally being four times longer than any other event he has contested to date.Kevin and his team have already been busy in the build up to the Welsh classic, being filmed for S4C's Welsh language program Ralio for transmission prior to the September 15-18 event. Davies taking time to demonstrate his skills for the cameras as part of the build up to the big event at a test recently. Cool as ever, unflappable Kevin was playing down talk of success though, and is keen to concentrate on one goal and one only - finishing the event:'I can hardly believe that I am going to do the rally' said Kevin. 'Less than a year ago forest rallying was something I had only spectated at, so to have now won a championship title and be contesting Wales Rally GB is just a complete dream come true for me. I really cannot thank my team and my sponsors enough for working so hard to give me this opportunity on such a massive event. Emyr and I are really looking forward to the challenge - and what a challenge it is! We are used to doing rallies of around 45 stage miles in length - on this rally we will be doing over 80 stage miles in a day - and sometimes more!I've no doubt that the GJM prepared Micra will be more than ready for such a daunting task, so it will definitely be a case of 'steady away' to try and get the right pace for the first day's action. Of course I'm very nervous about such a task in front of me, but as long as we treat it like a normal rally and get through it bit by bit, I'm sure we will be able to concentrate on getting a good finish'.