Welsh rally star Osian Pryce heads to this weekend’s Scottish Rally looking to give his British Rally Championships title hopes a lift.

The event is one of British rallying’s greatest challenges and this year won’t be any different as some of Europe’s finest motorsport talent meets in Dumfries to take on the classic roads.

“I’ve always enjoyed the Scottish,” said Pryce, second in the championship, who will drive his usual Alphera/Hills Ford Fiesta R5.

“It’s an event with real heritage and when you see the names on the winner’s trophy, you appreciate what this one means.”

To Pryce and co-driver Dale Furniss, victory would be nice, but it’s points that are the real prize.
 
The Machynlleth flier added: “It goes without saying that we want to win the rally, that’s what we’re going there for.

“But the objective this year is to be British Rally Champions; we’ve finished runner-up in this championship too many times!
 
“The problem with that kind of strategy in Scotland is that the event is quite short in mileage.

“We’ll have to be right on the money from the start of the very first stage to make sure we don’t drop time to our rivals.

“If you give away five or 10 seconds in the first one, you’re on the back foot for the rest of the rally and trying to catch that time back on these roads can be very, very tricky.

“Some parts of the rough could be quite rough and there’s a real risk of a puncture through there – you want to be going into those sections with some sort of margin.

“Ideally, you don’t want to be on the doorhandles trying to pull time back.

“The perfect scenario for us is to be close to the pace at the front, but able to control our speed and drive our own rally.”

Pryce is well aware of the threat posed by his rivals and he’ll be keeping an eye on Scotsman David Bogie next week.
 
He added: “These are David’s local stages.

“I drive my local roads in Wales, so I know what kind of an advantage it will give him.

“He will be more familiar with the place, but almost more than that he’ll have a feeling, an edge; it’s almost indescribable, but when you’re at home everything’s that bit more comfortable. And when it’s comfortable, it’s usually quick.”

Pryce knows what it takes to succeed in Scotland though, having led three years ago.
 
“We were going really well in the DS 3,” he added. “But then the window on my side got blown out, ironically on the Windy Hill stage!

“The car then filled with dust, but that wasn’t the biggest problem – we had a pretty major issue with the gearbox that cost us the lead and probably the win.”
 
“I’m feeling better and better with this car.

“The good thing with the Scottish is that it comes pretty hard on the heels of the last round [the Pirelli International Rally, where Osian finished second] and the terrain next week isn’t too dissimilar to what we had in Kielder.

“The good news from the last rally is that Spencer Sport has discovered what had caused the couple of issues we had on the Pirelli, so – like Dale and I – the Fiesta is fit and ready for round three.”

RSAC Scottish Rally – the detail 


May 19-20


Based: Dumfries


Service Lockerbie


Stages: 10


Total distance 177 miles


Competitive distance: 74 miles