After taking on the might of Australian Rallying at the recent
ARC round in South Australia by taking out the top 10 shootout
against all classes of vehicles the Polaris Racing Team of 4 time
Asia Pacific Rally Champion Cody Crocker and his esteemed co-driver
Greg Foletta are set to tackle the 13 stages covering 190km over
three days of rallying this weekend at Rally Australia in Coffs
Harbour.
Rally veteran Crocker has his eyes set on gold for this year's
Rally Australia in his Polaris RZR XP 1000 and while he battles for
first place in the SXS class he will need to keep an eye over his
shoulder as Scott Pedder looks to join the Rally Elite and chases
down Crocker's previous records from his Subaru days.
Since the inception of the Australian Rally Championship in 1968
only a select trio of elite drivers have been able to claim to have
won a rally in all seven regularly visited States and Territories.
Scott Pedder in his Renault Clio R3 is chasing down this record to
join the ranks of a select few being Neal Bates, Possum Bourne and
Cody Crocker who have placed first in each state/territory totaling
7 rally's.
Crocker and Foletta enter Rally Australia this weekend on the
back of an historic result at the recent round in South Australia.
Crowds got behind the rally veterans as they chased every
millisecond over the "Gawler Cup" stage. The Gawler Cup is a top 10
shoot out over a 1.05km stage in the town of Gawler and involves
the fastest 10 qualifiers out of all classes in the Rally. Crocker
and Foletta made history by placing first by a nail biting .1 of a
second over the 2014 Western Australian Rally winning team of
Reeves/Gelsomino in their Mazda 2 by a narrow .1 of a second.
"This was just revolutionary; the SXS class has shown it can not
only match, but beat, Australia's best in all vehicle classes! If
this doesn't change people's perceptions of the SXS (side-by-side)
class I don't know what will! This is yet another display of how a
race ready Polaris RZR XP 1000 for $35-40k can not only compete but
win up against the best the Rally world has to offer. Most of the
other machines in the top 10 are easily worth $100k plus and they
easily cost over $100k to keep running" said Cody Crocker
"Rallying for us is not just about winning in the SXS class, we
want to dominate overall! Other classes and drivers better watch
their backs, Polaris are coming!" said Greg Foletta
Rally Australia has a short stage in Coffs Harbour of 1.56km,
can Crocker and Foletta again post the fastest time out of all
competitors? One thing is for sure, Crocker isn't going to let
Pedder come in and equal his record without a fight.
Rally Australia is the premier round in the ARC calendar with
the round playing host to the Australian leg of the World Rally
Championship (WRC). Last year at Coffs Harbour the Polaris team of
Crocker/Foletta and Can-Am team of Guest/Green battled on every
stage with only seconds between them.
"Last year at Coffs Harbour was an extremely competitive Rally,
all of the teams had pace so the Rally was extremely competitive
and nail biting! This is the way Rally's should be, every single
thing we could do to make the RZR go faster we were doing, right
down to ensuring the fuel we had in the tank was precisely how much
we needed prior to the next refuel to save weight! We are pumped
for this year's race as no doubt all of the teams will give it a
fair crack" said Cody Crocker
For live updates from Rally Australia follow all of the action
on the Polaris Australia Facebook page.
About Polaris Industries & Polaris Racing Australia
Polaris is a recognized leader in the powersports industry with
annual sales exceeding $3.8 billion. Polaris designs, engineers,
manufactures and markets innovative, high quality off-road vehicles
(ORVs), including all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) and the Polaris
RANGER & RZR side-by-side vehicles, snowmobiles, motorcycles
and on-road electric/hybrid powered vehicles.
Polaris Racing is spear headed by Rally veteran former Subaru
Australia Rally Team Driver, 4 time Asia Pacific Rally Champion
Cody Crocker and longtime co-driver and friend Greg Foletta.
The ARC SXS Challenge is designed to avoid "cheque book" racing,
anyone can enter the SXS class of the ARC with a Polaris RZR and
all they need to add is the required CAMS safety cage and
equipment. This puts everyone on a level playing field and makes
motorsport very accessible with low costs involved compared to that
of a properly set up Rally Car.
Media Contact:
Robert Rosengarten
Marketing Specialist – Off Road Vehicles
Polaris Industries | Australia & New Zealand