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PG Andersson of Proton - great first day in Rally New Caledonia

Posted: 28 Apr 2012 04:43 AM PDT



PROTON's PG Andersson enjoyed an inspiring opening day by emerging fastest throughout the first four special stages in Rally New Caledonia.

Andersson won three of the day's four special stages, stamping his authority from the first 16.8km "Gadji" special stage to finish 1.6 seconds ahead of the two Skoda Fabia S2000s of Chris Atkinson and Gaurav Gill, with PROTON team mate Alister McRae in fourth place.

Andersson was quickest in the Satria Neo S2000 as he swept through the longest special stage of the day, a tricky section with many twisty uphill as well as downhill sections.

In special stage 2, Andersson was a clear three seconds faster than Atkinson, completing the run in a time of 10 minutes and 15.7 seconds.

McRae however, was forced to bow out after special stage 2 as a result of damage. He managed to drive the Satria Neo S2000 out of the stage but with a 25km drive and two special stages to go, the damage on the car was too extensive for him to continue. McRae will restart Leg 2 under the Super Rally format.

"We were flat out and on the attack mode from the start. The stages are incredibly exciting and the car felt unbelievably fast and planted through the twisty stages," said Andersson who in special stage 3 again clocked the fastest time ahead of Atkinson.

The Swedish driver however, missed out on making a clean sweep of the day's four special stages, finishing three seconds adrift of the Skodas of Gill, who was fastest, and Atkinson.

PROTON is looking to establish back to back victory in New Caledonia, having won the rally last year.

Rally New Caledonia runs through beautiful lush vegetation and farming plains, and will be contested over a competitive distance of 252.82km covering 19 special stages.

Leg 2 of the rally continues with nine more special stages while the third and the final day of rallying will involve six special stages including the longest which is a 24.41km charge through Pirogues Almameto.

"Andersson has adapted very well to the rally, considering this is his first appearance in New Caledonia. The competition is definitely intense this time round and with two more days of rallying it will really be down to the individual with the right strategy and the ability to pace himself to the finish," said Datuk Abdul Razak Dawood, the Head of PROTON Motorsports.

"We have a competitive package coming to New Caledonia and we believe we are in good contention for a podium," he added.

Mazda RX-8 gets a new life extension

Posted: 28 Apr 2012 04:23 AM PDT



Last November Mazda Japan has announced the final run-out edition of its RX-8 sports car, called Spirit R. Mazda planned to build 1000 units of these until June 2012, when the RX-8 will officially be retired. At that time, Mazda already pulled the RX-8 from all export markets, leaving it only as JDM model, no thanks to the ever tightening European emission legislation. Today, those 1000 units are sold-out. Hence, Mazda announced an extension to those original allocation by further 1000 units.

For a recap, Mazda RX-8 Spirit R are available with manual and gearbox where both are based on Type RS and Type E model respectively. The car comes with a host of accessories such as all around lighting with black bezels, red brake calipers, piano black floor console trim, sports suspension and gun metallic alloy wheels (19" for the manual version). The cabin is trimmed in black and red theme, signifying the Spirit R sporting intent.

For Malaysian boys, the 4 seater Mazda with rotary-engined sports car can be have from as cheap as RM82,000 for year 2003 model, registered in Malaysia and has run for about 70,000km. The unregistered examples can be have for RM130,000 for 2006 build version. The Spirit R version will take some more years though to arrive here via the grey importer. The delicious-looking interior photo can be found after the jump.
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