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Belgium’s festival on the 26th Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique continued on Saturday in RS4, the final regularity stage of a fine day of rallying in the sunshine. Thanks to the Opel Ascona 400 of Michel Decremer and Jennifer Hugo, flying the colours of Radio Monte-Carlo.
They were excellent all day, and they were rewarded at the end: the Belgian duo Decremer-Hugo won the most beautiful regularity stage of the day, in the Vercors massif, via Col de l’Echarasson where, for the first time in the rally, there was some snow in places. But not on the road, which was perfectly dry. And on Saturday evening, they were on top of the overall standings!
Between La Cîme du Mas and Col Gaudissart (17.4 km), the crew of the number 25 Ascona did slightly better than the rally’s benchmark crew, made up of Bruno Saby and Denis Giraudet, in their 1970 Ford Capri 2300 S. Quite a performance, given the CVs of the two men, the first one a winner of the WRC version of Rallye Monte-Carlo, in 1988, and the other a legendary co-driver who has navigated many of the best drivers of his generation in the world’s greatest rallies.
In this stage set in a breathtaking background, the places of honour were taken by the Renault 5 Alpine of Jean-Pierre Verneuil and Jean-Marc Piret, tied in 3rd place with the Morris Mini Cooper S of Ferrucio and Carlo Nessi, not to forget the Alfa Romeo 2000 GTV of the youngest competitors in this 26th edition, Julien Picoreau and Camille Béal. Both are only 23 years old, so they weren’t even born when the first edition of Rallye Monte Carlo Historique took place.
After a particularly festive final checkpoint from 5pm in Saint-Jean-en-Royans, all the surviving competitors arrived at Champ de Mars in Valence, from 6.30pm onwards. With the exception of a few crews who dropped out en route, due to a variety of mechanical incidents, this was a very fine day of historic rallying.
