Dan Rooke completed a clean sweep of heat wins as he recorded a comprehensive win in the latest British Rallycross Championship round in Belgium.
Rooke went the entire weekend on the Maasmechelen Circuit unbeaten, winning each time he hit the circuit, as well as his semi-final and final heats, ahead of Julian Godfrey in second. Ollie O’Donovan in his Ford Focus Supercar completed the podium positions in third.
Pat Doran in his Citroën C4 finished fourth in the final, in which the British RX event ran together with the Belgian Rallycross Championship. Home boys Jos Jansen and Johnny Verkuringen completed the final six competitors in fifth and sixth places respectively.
Rooke said post-Belgium British RX “I’m really happy, the weekend has gone so much better than any of us could have imagined, it’s a really strong haul of points for the championship. We couldn’t have asked for much more and my confidence in myself and the car is growing with each event. We just need to take each event at a time but I’m really looking forward to racing at Lydden next time out.”
Reigning British RX Champion Godfrey is now 21 points behind Rooke in second. “I had a difficult start to the weekend, I got a bit held up in Q1 and then broke a driveshaft after contact in Q2. Dan was quick here. We made changes to the car in the final so we were closer to him than before. The championship is still possible. I need Dan to have a bad weekend really, but he doesn’t have many of them.”
O’Donovan keeps his title hopes alive in joint-third in the standings, adding “Dan is really quick and I just couldn’t live with the two boys at the front in the final. I’ll have to work on that for the next round. I really like the track here, it’s a good drivers’ track and it’s great to be on the podium.”
