Érdi Jr’s “safely push” puts him on course for title glory in Greece
Tibor Érdi Jr is on course to win the 2024 FIA European Historic Rally Championship thanks to his “safely push” approach to the opening leg of the Historic Acropolis Rally (Saturday).
Running first on the road on the season-deciding event, Hungarian Érdi Jr can take the first overall FIA EHRC title to be awarded by scoring maximum points, vindicating his decision to blend speed with a degree of caution on the challenging Greek gravel roads.
“It was very slippery being the first car and very loose,” Érdi Jr said. “So we search for the good speed, not too much, not too slow. We drive safely push and it was okay. The first position [on the road] made it difficult, [it was] much cleaner after seven or eight cars. But no problem, we try to go to the finish because we want to win the championship not the rally. The car is okay, we don’t have technical problems.”
With six of the rally’s 11 stages completed, Érdi Jr leads the FIA EHRC section of the Historic Acropolis Rally by 14.9s ahead of championship newcomer Richard Jordan in a Category 3 Ford Escort RS 2000.
Christophe Jacob, who was confirmed as the Category 3 runner-up with the 10 points scored for starting the rally in front of the famous Acropolis in the Greek capital Athens on Friday afternoon, is third overall at the wheel of a Ford Escort RS followed by Ernie Graham, who is locked in a battle with Érdi Jr for the Category 4 crown and the overall FIA EHRC title.
“We’re on about the right pace but Christophe took a lot of time off us on [SS4] because we were sleeping a wee bit in that one,” Graham explained. “Richard Jordan’s going well, he’s a quick one, and Christophe is standing in our way – we need to get ahead of him to finish second in the championship. But we’ve had no issues, we just need to keep going with a nice a steady pace.”
Jordan, who had never previously rallied outside the United Kingdom, revealed a near-miss on SS2. “There’s a lot of work to do in the stages, there’s a lot of loose and you’re trying to find some traction where there’s none anywhere,” Jordan said. “We nipped a wheel bearing earlier and in stage two we had a massive overshoot in fourth gear.”
Jacob’s biggest issue occurred on SS1, as he explained: “There was a smell of petrol in the car on the first stage so I opened up the window, which was not a good idea because all the dust came in and I couldn’t breathe anymore. We’ve just been trying to preserve the car and tyres by avoiding the big stones.”
Making his debut in a Category 4-specification Ford Escort, FIA EHRC Category 1 champion James Potter is fifth after six stages in the second Flexifly Rally Team entry.
“I didn’t do the recce so every stage and every corner is new but I’m enjoying it, it’s hard not to enjoy this car,” Potter said. “I’ll press on, see what I can do and hopefully get to the end. I preferred the harder surface this afternoon.”
Lancia 037-powered Alexandros Christodoulou, making his first FIA EHRC start since last year’s Historic Acropolis Rally, is sixth among the FIA EHRC contenders.
After contesting the Lahti and Elba rounds in a recently-completed Saab 99, Siegfried Mayr is back in his Volvo 240, which he used during last month’s FIA Motorsport Games as part of Team Germany. Co-driven by his wife Renate, Mayr holds seventh place overnight despite a moment when he ran through a ditch.
Piotr Gadomski, who secured the inaugural FIA EHRC Front Wheel Drive Trophy by taking the start, is eighth aboard his Toyota Corolla AE82, followed by Andrea Farmakakis, who is tackling his first gravel event in 20 years.
Having contested the previous two FIA EHRC rounds in a BMW M3, Maciej Lubiak failed to complete SS1 after his Category 3 Porsche 911 3.0 SC suffered driveshaft failure. The Pole had earlier picked up front-left bodywork damage in his pursuit of a rapid stage time.
Today’s deciding leg north of Itea begins with the repeat of Saturday’s Karoutes night stage from 09:23 hrs ahead of the first of two visits to the Parnassos test (15.27 kilometres) from 11:16 hrs. Prossilio (12.22 kilometres), another double-use stage, is up next. Like Parnassos, Prossilio is a famous Acropolis Rally stage from the past.
Parnassos and Prossilio are repeated at 15:02 hrs and 16:05 hrs respectively with the finish scheduled in Itea from 16:45 hrs. In total, 11 stages are scheduled over a competitive distance of 154.65 kilometres.
