By Paul Evans
Jason Pritchard will begin the defence of his Protyre Motorsport UK Asphalt Rally Championship title on the Rallynuts National Tour of Epynt Rally a week today (Sunday 10 March) – even though he hasn’t even seen his North Road Garage-backed Ford Focus WRC05 since he won the title over four months ago!
The car is kept in Carlisle, meaning the Builth Wells driver rarely sees it – and as it’s an extremely busy time in the family’s Toyota dealership, Pritchard is unlikely to even sit in the powerful four-wheel drive rocket until the day before next weekend’s event.
Co-driven by Phil Clarke, Pritchard will be aiming for a good start to the season, as he aims for an incredible fifth major rally title in as many years – having won a record-breaking three MSA British Historic Rally Championships in a row (2015, ’16 and ‘17) and the 2018 Asphalt Rally Championship crown.
As last year, Pritchard will alternate during the season between his Focus WRC, in which he won three rallies last season, and the Fiesta S2000 he drove to third place on last year’s Tour of Epynt.
Yet one of Pritchard’s biggest goals this season is to try to win the Roger Albert Clark Rally (21-25 November) – an historic rally ran in the spirit of the old RAC Rally, with gravel forest stages in Wales, the Lake District, Scotland and the North East of England. On that event, Pritchard will drive his full historic-spec Ford Escort Mk2 RS1800.
“I haven’t even seen the Focus WRC since we competed on Otterburn last October, so it will be nice to get back in it,” said Pritchard.
“I haven’t really had any time to think too much about defending my title, as with new car registrations in March we are very busy here in the Toyota dealership. That means I won’t have time to test the car before the first rally of the season either – although that isn’t unusual, because work means that I never have done any pre-season testing! Work is one of the main reasons we register to do a rally championship, because unless we made that commitment we’d never leave the North Road Garage showroom!
“It would be nice to win another championship – five in a row would be something special. However, one of our main aims for this season is to try to win the Roger Albert Clark Rally in my Escort Mk2. It’s a tremendous event and it’s a rally I now want to win more than any other.”