WRC Shakedown, Border Ranges Rally 2009

[SakeMan]

We had a massive weekend of motorsport, Saturday we spent the day eating dust and getting covered in crap, about 2 hours west of Brisbane for the annual Border Ranges Rally. An awesome event for us, it was used as the shakedown for officials that will be attending WRC early next month, we were invited along and had an awesome time being able to shoot with the freedom we've always wanted. Shame that we won't be official photogs for WRC haha. The pics below are probably my favourite of the day, we managed to shoot 2 passes of the field in SS1 so I am quite happy with the results, the start at the night stage was something new for me, I didn't have a flash so was experementing.

C&C as always appreciated!

1.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr24.jpg

2.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr30.jpg

3.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr26.jpg

4.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr38.jpg

5.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr37.jpg

6.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr33.jpg

7.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr41.jpg

8.
http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au/images/brr42.jpg

[Echo63]

Great series
love the glowing brakes in #2, and #4 is great too

[chrispons]

Wonderful light and dust and water.
An excellent and very enjoyable series of very sharp well exposed shots.
Thanks for posting,
Pons

[Phenix3st]

Love the driving pictures in the dirts. the dust and gravel flying through the air looks amazing.

And the shot of the car in the water is perfect:) looks so cool. Did any parts come off the car going through the water? looks like the water was going through the car pretty hard.


The Picture of the co driver going over notes is pretty cool. too bad his hand and book were moving though.

Very nice

[SakeMan]

Hey thanks for all the nice comments! No, as far as I noticed no parts came off any cars through the watercrossing, a lot them did hit the water quite hard though.

[Jamescookphoto]

#7 is a fantastic pic. Well done.

JCP

[tran]

nice set of pictures!

[jac31k]

Mate, great set - sends chills down my spine to know that i'll be there in a few weeks

Are these similar stages to the WRC ones? what should I expect to be different?

[GregLeeman]

I love number 4, did the crew mind? you used a tripod though? I do Rallying at night and would love a shot of me like this

[24alpha]

Awesome series! Thanks for sharing.

[SakeMan]

Mate, great set - sends chills down my spine to know that i'll be there in a few weeks



Are these similar stages to the WRC ones? what should I expect to be different?

You and me both mate, I can't wait! Got the running list today and it sent shivers down my spine seeing Loeb and co on it! As for what's going to be different, obviously the top cars might move at a much more rapid pace, there will be quite a few tarmac stages, the Super Special around town in Murwillumbah will be the event to watch, should be insane. The actual scenery will be very similar, this was photographed probably a good 1-2 hour drive north of where WRC will be held.

I love number 4, did the crew mind? you used a tripod though? I do Rallying at night and would love a shot of me like this

Yeah thanks! I walked around the staging lane for the night stage and saw the co driver study the pace notes (blind rally so they didn't have their own notes) I didn't use a tripod, just a slowish shutter speed around 1/30s shot at f/2.8 on my 24-70, ISO would have been around 1600 on the 5D Mark II.

Thanks for the comments from everyone else, if you are keen to see more of these just check them out on our website, there is a full set of about 300 shots on there. http://www.motorsportphotography.com.au

[jac31k]

!! :D

[techlab2k]

I like 2 & 4. 2 reminds me, I must go clay shooting before my next night stages to get my eye in.

[Rhodri.Lew10]

Cracking set of shots, we can only dream of having light like that in the UK! The watersplash shot is superb as are the low angle shots. Also like the atmospheric shot of the Navigator going about his business.

Thanks for sharing,

Rhod.

[irishvintagecars]

You Lucky Lucky boys. When the WRC was here in Ireland earlier on this year we were soaked to the skin standing out in the rain waching all of the action. But when you are committed to taking photos at this sport you too would spend over 2 hours photographing a citroen team repair one of their cars without moving from the one spot and then collapsing to the ground after you were finshed while bending down to pick up your camera bag. now thats true. have a great rally lads ad i am jealous as hell. lol:)

[SakeMan]

Thanks for the comments again. Yes I have to say that even though I like to bitch about the light here in QLD, especially in Winter, no clouds and the sun is always very intense, for these shots it worked in our favour. I would love it if we suddenly had a lot of rain in the next 2 weeks before and during WRC, it will get the creeks flowing again for some great watercrossings and will settle all that dust down a bit that we have now, either way I am so keen to shoot it you don't even know, going to spend most of next weekend doing recce in location so we can bring you guys some more nice shots but this time with higher caliber cars also.

[Welby]

Nice one's Sake, i'm hoping to get up there myself if all things go to plan.