30ème Rallye National de la Vienne 2022 - Moderne

Christian and Nathalie Roulleaux in their Peugeot 206 Super 1600 on ES3.  They eventually hit mechanical issues that prevented them finishing.

The 2022 Rallye de la Vienne was the thirtieth running of the event and was a national tarmac rally event counting for 'La Coupe de France des Rallyes coefficient 3' and the local regional league championship of Nouvelle Aquitaine Nord.   There were 94 cars that started the rally and 67 that finished.  The rally was held over 12 special stages on Saturday 12th March 2022.  In total there were 132km of special stages for which an interesting and varied field of GT and touring cars assembled and many of them can be seen in action from the photos I took on ES1 and ES3.     There was a good battle for the lead of the rally between the R5 cars 1 (Hernandez) and 2 (Millet) with the GT3 Porsche of Anthony Cosson keeping them on their toes.  Also nice to see some young talent doing well on the rally such as Matteo Chatillon.

A couple of competitors were hurt on this rally when they crashed in to an empty house.  I wish them a fast recovery.

It was also good to see so many spectators at this rally, even if at times it made it difficult to get close to the action (I am an amateur photographer with no media pass, so I shoot from the public zones)..... but good to see you all there. good to to know that I am not the only one to enjoy rally cars.

The Citroën C2 of Romain Fouquet and Benoît Ducroix on ES3.  They retired with mechanical issues on ES9.

It may surprise some of my readers that local hero Simon Pagenaud won this rally back in 2014.  He of course went on to win the Indy Car series in 2016 and the Indy 500 in 2019.   He is quoted as saying that rallying is his favourite type of motorsport.  For Simon Pagenaud Indy Car pictures click here.

Sébastien and Delphine Gallard show us how to take a tight hairpin bend in their Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 8 with a big slide and opposite lock correction.  Very entertaining for the spectators.

For those interested, I took all of the photos (except of the drivers) on a Canon 7D Mk II DLSR and used the following lenses; 100-400mm zoom, 17-55mm zoom and 135mm F2.  The pictures with the particularly high quality and slightly blurry backgrounds were taken with the latter lens.  Where I was forced to be a long way way from the action I used the longer zoom and when very close to the action the shorter zoom.   Hopefully, you will enjoy seeing this selection of the rally cars and their drivers that take part in French rallies in my region.

For the VHC historic rally cars that competed on this rally, click here.

For the 2022 Bordeaux Aquitaine Classic Rally (Modern), click here.

Some of the cars that finished in the top fifty:

For a change, I have put the cars in reverse order.

In 49th position, the Citroën Saxo Kit Car of Daniel Pedeneau and Goulven Treguier.

In 45th position, The BMW 320i of Fabien Prevoteau and Charlotte Hivert.

In 35th position and lifting a rear wheel, the Peugeot 208 of Samuel Rollier and Emilie Perrinaud.

In 31st position, the Peugeot 207 RC of Nicolas Foulon and Frédéric Evin.

A wider angle view of the ES3 hairpin bend and the 29th placed Renault Clio RS of Denis and Alain Saulnier.

In 27th position, the Peugeot 206 RC of Alexandre Roux and Séverine Sarrazin.

In 26th position and winner of class FRC4/A6K, the Peugeot 206 of Sébatien Gourdon and Romain Metayer.

In 18th position, the Renault Megane of Jonathan Dubray and Christelle Garilliere.

In 16th position, the Hyundai i20 of Jonathan Orens and Franck Mercier.

In 14th position and lifting up a rear wheel, the Renault Clio III RS of Thierry Boisdron and Sandrine Caramigeas.  For Thierry it was his 22nd time of competing in the Rallye de la Vienne, which is more than anyone else.  He has had a podium finish in the past.

In 13th position, the Porsche 997 GT3 RS of Philippe Taffonneau and Julien Boulet.  Philippe won this rally in 2017 in a Porsche.

In 11th position and winner of class F214, the Renault Clio Ragnotti of Anthony Langlois and Eric Meudic.

In tenth position and winner of class R3, the Renault Clio RS of Dimitri Charles and Flavien Rateau.

In ninth position, the Porsche 997 of Alain Colin and Eric Daguze.

In seventh position and winner of Group FRC4, the Peugeot 208 of Matteo Chatillon and Maxence Cornuau.  Very good to see this young 20 year old local driver do so well in his first event this year having entered as a junior in various rallies over the last couple of years..  Maybe he will be a star of the future.

In sixth position, the Skoda Fabia of Fabien and Jérôme Despois.

In fifth position and winner of the French Rally Nat Group, the Mitsubishi Lancia Evo X of Michel and Sylvie Bourgeois.

In fourth position, the Volkswagen Polo of Bruno Longepe and Ronan Choucroun.

In third position and winner of the FRGT Group, the Porsche 991 GT3 of Anthony Cosson and Kévin Millet.   They won ES4 and ES7.  In 2020 Anthony had finished second on this rally in a Skoda and won the Bordeaux Aquitaine Classic recently at the end of February in this Porsche, so was expected to do well.  Perhaps, the damp early stages didn't help his chances of doing better.

In second position, the Volkswagen Polo GTi of Denis Millet and Manon Verger.  They won the first three stages of this rally when it was damp.

A short rest for Denis and Manon before ES4.  At this stage they were leading the rally and were really going well.  Denis was probably hoping to add to the four wins he has had in the last year.

The winner of the rally was this Skoda Fabia of Nicolas Hernandez and Mathieu Maurin.  They won seven of the twelve stages and led from the end of stage eight onwards.  For local boy Nicolas it was his fourth win in this rally in a row (2018,19,20,22).  

John Etherton asserts his copyright to all of the photos on this blogpost.  However, you may post the photos elsewhere on the web as long as you credit the photographer, John Etherton, and this blog post, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com and provide a link to this page.

John Etherton affirme son droit d'auteur à l'ensemble des photos sur ce billet de blog. Cependant, vous pouvez poster des photos ailleurs sur le web aussi longtemps que vous créditez le photographe, John Etherton, et ce blog, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com et fournissez un lien vers cette page.

Some of the Porsche rally drivers chatting before the start of ES4.  Anthony Cosson facing us in the centre and his co-driver Kévin Millet on the left.  Alain Colin is on the right and Eric Daguze has his back to us.

4ème Rallye nationale Bordeaux Aquitaine Classic, 2022.

It is always a pleasure to see an Alpine A110.  This one crewed by Jean-Luc Roche and Alexandra Robin finished seventh overall on the rally and won its class.

The eighth running of the Rallye Bordeaux Aquitaine Classic was the fourth time it had included modern rally cars and qualified for 'La coupe de France des Rallyes 2022' (coefficient 3) as well as the regional league.   Taking place over the last weekend of February it was run over three different stages (each taken four times) in a small area near Castillion-la-Bataille to the east of Bordeaux in the Gironde department of France.  Total distance of the twelve special stages was just under 140km.  As usual in France, these were tarmac stages.

I attended the first special stage on the Saturday, starting in Saint-Quentin-de-Caplong.  I was in a field on the D18 near Pessac-sur-Dordogne.  Surprisingly, there were very few of us and thus I had no problem getting good access for my photos.

Pre-rally favourires were  Patrick Rouillard (Skoda Fabia R5) who won in 2019, plus Bruno Longepe (Volkswagen Polo R5) and Tony Cosson (Porsche 991 GT3).  The bright and sunny but initially cold February weekend was to prove a good background for their battle, which for a time was very close.

My only disappointment from a photo opportunity point of view was that I was changing my lens when the rare Hommell Berlinette Echappement went by!   Photos were taken using Canon 100-400mm and 17-55mm zoom lenses.   After the first few competitors had gone by, I concentrated on trying to capture the speed of these rally cars.

All in all a lovely day that I enjoyed because of the sunshine, wonderful noise of these rally machine and pursuing my hobby of photographing fast cars.  After I got home, i followed the rally on the media to see if the Porsche won.

As well as the modern rally cars included in this post, there were the VHC and VHRS rally cars as well, with excellent fields, and these will be covered in future posts.

The Skoda Fabia R5 of Patrick Rouillard and Cedric Gamboni won the first stage, seen here, by a clear margin and looked very fast.  However, on the third stage he left the road and retired.

After the retirement of Rouillard, Bruno Longepe took up the battle with Tony Cosson.  At the end of stage 6 and the first day, Bruno led the rally by a very small margin in this Volkswagen Polo R5.  However, a poor showing on stage 9 meant that Bruno Longepe and Frédérique Lopez had to settle for an eventual second place and class win.

The winning Porsche 991 GT3 of Anthony Cosson and Florent Delpech.  This cars sounds and looks amazing and was definitely one of my favourites.

Third place on the podium fell to Frédéric Gobin and Jean-Luc Fraigne in a Skoda Fabia R5.

Fourth place and winner of their FNat Group was Loic and Yann Larquey in this Mitsubishi Lancer EvoX.

Fifth place and winner of the R2 class was this Peugeot 208 crewed by Nicolas Radet and Bastien Le Queau.

The winner of the R3 class and sixth place overall fell to Aurélien Pion and Maeva Perrinaud in this Renault Clio.

This BMW Compact of Yannick Lacouture and Christophe Chavanneau was fast on ES1 and at that time led the RNat Group.  They had finished second when the rally was last held in 2020.

In 24th place of the 64 starters and 34 finishers was this Peugeot 106 S16 of Marco and Aurélie Rodrigues Gaspar.

A Peugeot 106 SI driven by Nicolas Brasseur and Jeremie Chatard.

The Peugeot 306 S16 of Matthieu Hernandez and Théo Pawlak who finished 23rd overall and third in their N3 class.

Morgan and Emilien Cabaret finished 22nd overall in this Peugeot 206 RC and second in their A7 class.

Adding to the variety of cars was this Mercedes C180 crewed by Philippe and Marie-Pierre Pons.

John Etherton asserts his copyright to all of the photos on this blogpost.  However, you may post the photos elsewhere on the web as long as you credit the photographer, John Etherton, and this blog post, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com and provide a link to this page.

John Etherton affirme son droit d'auteur à l'ensemble des photos sur ce billet de blog. Cependant, vous pouvez poster des photos ailleurs sur le web aussi longtemps que vous créditez le photographe, John Etherton, et ce blog, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com et fournissez un lien vers cette page.

Another look at the winning Porsche 991 GT3.   A rare car in French rallying, it has won before in Tony's hands at the Rallye des Jardins de Sologne in 2021.  Previously, Tony had rallied a Skoda.