Most of us get into motorsport because we like cars or driving and want to go a bit faster in a safe and controlled environment. It’s a common story to see people progress through the various forms of grassroots competition as they build their skills or improve their cars or just get a bigger budget. For some this process might start very young in karts and even progress into a professional career but it's far more common to see grown-ups getting into the sport once they have been around the car scene for a while and can afford to jump in. For many this manifests in a mid life crisis once the kids have grown and the house is paid off.

The common ground for most of these people is that the end goal is to have fun, get an adrenalin boost or even just learn and grow or try something new. What you don't see is people getting into the sport because they think they are going to beat everyone and take home some trophies. For sure they might think they are good and they may really want to measure themselves against others to see where they stack up but even that is usually not about winning as much as it is about self-affirmation.

So it's odd then that a lot of racing talk (particularly in the media) focuses more on the result and less on the enjoyment, you can even see this in club level competition where in some events there are so many classes that 'every player wins a prize'.

My motorsport journey strangely started at the other end of the scale in my early 20's as a pit crew member for a privateer team in the then Australian Touring Car Championship. One of the first events I went to saw our team car on the grid with Brock, Johnston, Seton et all and hence my world view of motorsport was that it was something other (richer) people did. It took me a while to discover grassroots club level motorsport and to realise it was something I could do and that it wasn't all about winning.

My own journey has included a lot of not-winning although there has also been a measure of success along the way as the skills improved and this has netted a collection of trophies for numerous class wins, podium places and of course the all important participation awards (Targa plates). We have even had a couple of wins in tarmac events for the classic handicap and a couple more podium places in classic outright but we've never taken an outright Classic win in a rally.

If you think this is all building to something… yes, we finally won one!

The Gorge Rallysprint is a one day tarmac rally held on the iconic Gorge Road and Anstey Hill in the Adelaide Hills, run by the same team that run the famous Adelaide Rally and a number of gravel rally events in SA. The event comprises 12 stages (4 stages run twice and then in reverse) and is open for competition Modern and Classic and speed limited Challenge classes as well as tour categories.

For us it's a perfect event, rally HQ and the service park is about 5km from home and the roads are pretty much in our back yard and are part of my favourite route for a Sunday drive dodging the bikes. We came home second in this event last year (after the car in second crashed out) and the entry list while strong isn't long so we should do OK really except for one big but…

Our last event was the 2019 Adelaide Rally that ended early with a trip into the Armco and the car only came back from the crash shop recently so the expectations aren't high.

Still, a pre event shakedown at The Bend showed the car was strong and a couple of sessions on the corner weight scales and wheel alignment bars proved all was true and square underneath.

The first stage is a non-competitive shakedown run down Anstey Hill but it shows we are on the pace and by the time we get to the first regroup after stage 4 we have taken a stage win on Paracombe 1 and are sitting 1st in Classic just 2.4 seconds clear of the Streckeisen's 944 Turbo but the whole field of eight is within 30 secs at regroup.

The next run through to lunch saw stage 6 downgraded with a tour car crash, Nick Streckeisen out with mechanical damage and a stage win each to Matt Selley, Tim Pryzibilla and us leaving us with a lead of 8 seconds to Tim with Matt only another second behind in 3rd.

The stages after lunch are a reverse of the morning stages so a downhill run through Gorge Road before a final blast up Anstey Hill. Another couple of wins to us and a couple to Matt and oh-my-god we actually did it and won an event.

It's likely that Nick's 944 would have been in the mix (he did win last year after all) if they didn't suffer some mechanical gremlins but as they say, first you must finish….

I have to say this was a huge relief as the confidence had taken a bit of a hit with the crash last year but we knew the car was good, our notes and preparation were solid and the local knowledge would give us the confidence we needed.

It's also a great prep for the upcoming Adelaide Rally which is much longer, much harder and with a bigger field by some margin. Can we replicate this result at that event? Probably not, the longer and faster stages won't suit us as well plus there are some crews returning for this event that traditionally put us in the shade but if we can keep it on the black stuff then we might just sneak a top 5 result.

Or we could ignore the results and just focus on the experience instead? Yeah, right….

The Top Step