Saturday August 23rd marked the Rally Driving debut of Canberra Teenager
Tristan Kent. Kent who turned 17 on Wednesday and passed his licence on the
same day travelled to the Central North Coast of NSW to compete in the Rally
of the Manning Valley based out of Taree.

Tristan has been involved in Rallying for many years, navigating for his
father Mark since he was eligible at the age of 12, regularly competing in the
ACT series and some NSW and Australian championship rounds, Tristan is
probably most famous for the 2007 Rally of Canberra where he codrove for Peter
Jerie who had the spectacular crash over the Mineshaft.

Tristan has been planning for rally debut for many years, and is debuting in
his father's old rally car, a 1985 Subaru RX turbo. This is a good solid car
to learn in and is quite capable of some solid results. Also on board for his
debut Tristan has enlisted Ray Baker as his codriver, Ray has competed as both
a driver and codriver right up to World Rally level and use his his experience
to help Tristan grow as a driver.

The Rally of the Manning Valley was held over 8 stages with 133km of
competitive. 7 of the stages were held at night, with some of the stage quite
slippery from recent rains, whereas in other areas there was dust. Very
tricky conditions for Tristan to compete in for his first rally.

With Tristan starting 31st out of 33 cars, it was definetely going to be a
late night, with the first car starting at 3pm. The front cars, headed by
Glenn Brinkman from Queensland and Steve Forsberg from the Central coast were
all recent model Mitsubishi Lancers, a lot more highly developed than Tristans
reliable but slightly older technology Subaru.

The rally due to the conditions became the survival of the fittest with many
cars having trouble getting through the course, Tristan ended up finishing
16th and 1st in class. The event was won by Steve Forsberg, his first win
since returning from a several year sabbatical.

Tristan's next event will be the Bay Stages rally at Bateman's Bay on the 7th
of September, followed by the Caltex Airport Starmart rally in Canberra on the
28th of September.

For more information on Tristan and his rally adventures, please check out
www.bakermotorsport.net

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