REPORT / PLAINS RALLY 2025
02/06/2025WORDS BY: ANDY COOK | PHOTOGRAPHY BY: ANDREW SCOTT & NIGEL PRATT (BLACK MOUNTAINS MEDIA)
After months of waiting, the sounds of rally cars would once again reverberate around the Welsh countryside; at the 2025 Plains rally. This year, the Plains would not only see the event return to national rallying after suffering insufficient entries last year but would also signal the return of rallying to the Welsh Forests for the first time since the Cambrian Rally back in October last year.
From its rally HQ in Bala, the event would offer a distance of just over 40 stage miles, featuring classic-world-class Welsh gravel stages in the Alwen, Aberhirnant, and Dyfnant forest complexes. The Plains Rally was the third round of the 2025 British Historic Rally Championship and the second round of the Welsh Rally Championship and attracted a bumper entry, as competitors jumped at the chance to get back out in the Welsh forests.
Last time out in Kielder at the Carlisle Stages, David Crossen & Ben Teggart secured the overall BHRC win in their MKII Ford Escort ahead of Round 1 winners, Dan Mennell & John Roberts.
However, with the new category-based points scoring system this year, Barry Jordan in the Cat4 Mitsubishi Galant VR4 and Adam Milner in the Cat2 MK1 Ford Escort Mexico both arrived in Bala leading the BHRC standings, five points ahead of David Crossen and Dan Mennell.
Meanwhile, in the Welsh Championship, although Russ Thompson & Stephen Link drew first blood at the opening round of the season, taking the win ahead of Liam Clark and Emily Easton-Page. Thompson & Link would sit out the Plains, which opened the door for the likes of Liam Clark and James Giddings to gain some ground.
LEG 1
The event got underway with two stages in Alwen Forest, beginning with a 2.6-mile blast through the southern side of the Alwen Reservoir. Here is where Liam Clark (this time with Jack Morton in the Co-Driver seat), and Irishman Andrew Purcell (with Martin Brady) both set the benchmark times in their Ford Fiesta Rallys 2’s. Having stopped the clocks five seconds quicker than both Danial O’Brien & Niall Burns and James Giddings & Aled Davies.
On the Historics front, non-BHRC-registered crew Joe Price and Lucy Wilding would match the time of BHRC front-runners David Henderson & Chris Lees. They were both seven seconds ahead of a gaggle of BHRC crews who all recorded the same time; including George Lepley, a returning Seb Perez and Championship leader David Crossen, who picked up a puncture on the first stage.
Photo: David Henderson & Chris Lees | By Andrew Scott
Clark & Morton would eke out two seconds over Purcell & Brady in the second stage through the north side of Alwen Forest to take up position at the top of the leaderboard before the event moved southwards. Giddings and Co-Driver Aled Davies would round out the top three in their Mitsubishi EVO IX after those opening two tests.
Photo: Liam Clark & Jack Morton | By Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
Lepley & Dafydd Evans in their Mitsubishi Galant VR-4 and Crossen & Ben Teggart in their MKII Ford Escort RS1800 would lead the way for the British Historic Rally Championship crews, both holding a three-second gap to Danial Mennell & John Roberts.
The drama wasn’t confined to the first stage, sadly for reigning BHRC Champ Seb Perez, his Championship comeback was short-lived, retiring his Porsche 911 from the event in the second stage with a broken gearbox. The morning would also not go well for his teammate Ben Smith, who snapped a rear arm on his Porsche 911. Smith, would head back to service early after SS2 Alwen North 1; however would super rally and return to the stages in the afternoon having helped himself to a replacement part off of Perez’s car, if only to gain some seat time.
A stone’s throw from the rally HQ in Bala, Aberhirnant, was another classic Welsh test that was on the menu. Again, Clark & Morton pipped Purcell & Brady on the clocks, this time by just a single second.
Photo: David Crossen & Ben Teggart | By Andrew Scott
Despite being his first time ever having a go at this stage, Crossen had a clean run and was able to find three seconds from Lepley, earning him the lead of the historics field; with Henderson & Lees leap-frogging Mennell & Roberts into third. “It’s fast, it takes some commitment in there, the race is still on?” Mennell said.
The longest test of the rally at 6.25 miles through Dyfnant Forest would see the crews through to the mid-day service halt back in Bala and the stage would also see a change in the lead of the rally.
Photo: Andrew Purcell & Martin Brady | By Andrew Scott
Andrew Purcell & Martin Brady would take their first outright stage win here in Dyfnant, stopping the clocks some seven seconds sooner than Giddings & Davies. Clark & Morton would drop some eleven seconds with some mechanical issues when the car went into two-wheel drive. This added a deficit of eight seconds to Purcell at the halfway point in the rally.
Lepley & Evans would take the lead of the Historics in Dyfnant, the slightly longer stage meant that the pair were able to stretch out the legs of that Group A Mitsubishi Galant, gaining a chunk of time over Crossen & Teggart in the MKII Escort to lead the field by eleven seconds.
Photo: George Lepley & Dafydd Evans | By Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
Crossen was still the best of the rest in that sea of trailing MKII Escorts, but with just a single second between him and Henderson and Mennell in joint third, the battle was, like the weather, looking hot for the repeated afternoon loop.
Photos: David Crossen & Ben Teggart | Adam Milner & Roy Jarvis | By Andrew Scott
Elsewhere, Adam Milner & Roy Jarvis, now with two Category 2 wins under their belts from the two northern-based events; found themselves making an out-of-character trip down to Wales, perhaps already with their eyes on the overall Championship. Despite picking up a puncture on the opening stage of the day (Alwen South), they drove their MK1 Ford Escort Mexico around the morning stages a heck of a lot quicker than their closest category competitors, namely Tim Pearcey & Ifan Devine in their MK1 Ford Escort RS1600.
AFTER STAGE 4
| POS | LEADERBOARD | CLASS | TIME (DIF) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | #25 A.PURCELL / M.BRADY | 1 | 19:03 |
| 2 | #2 L.CLARK / J.MORTON | 1 | 19:11 (+8) |
| 3 | #5 J.GIDDINGS / A.DAVIES | 2 | 19:29 (+18) |
| 4 | #2 M.OBRIEN / N.BURNS | 1 | 19:40 (+11) |
| 5 | #201 G.LEPLEY / D.EVANS | H12 | 19:50 (+10) |
| 6 | #207 D.CROSSEN / B.TEGGART | H8 | 20:09 (+19) |
| = 7 | #208 D.HENDERSON / C.LEES | H8 | 20:10 (+1) |
| = 7 | #209 D.MENNELL / J.ROBERTS | H8 | 20:10 (+0) |
| 9 | #203 J.PRICE / L.WILDING | H8 | 20:26 (+16) |
| 10 | #7 S.PATTISON / P.WHITTAKER | 2 | 20:28 (+2) |
LEG 2
After Service, the rally resumed in Alwen Forest, Purcell & Brady now sensing a potential win, headed back out on a bit of a mission. Adding a further two seconds to their lead in stage five to hold a ten-second lead over Clark & Morton.
“It’s going ok, we are here for some millage and enjoying it, the stages are tricky, never been here before”
Andrew Purcell
But Clark was not ready to give up without a fight just yet and reacted in the very next stage, SS6 Alwen North 2, to claw back three of those seconds.
“It was going alright up until stage four, it was a two-wheel drive car then and the handbrake release was sticking a bit on it, but we’ve bleed it all up [in service] and hopefully it will be alright this afternoon.
Liam Clark
Over those two repeated Alwen tests, David Crossen & Ben Teggart would mount their challenge for glory. Picking up the stage win in the second pass of Alwen South to bring the gap to Lepley down to thirteen seconds.
“It’s hard to commit, you get around a bad bit, but we’re that tight that you just have to take your chances and go flat out”, “We had a spin in Dyfnant, it was just a bad stage for us but these last two in Alwen have been good”
David Crossen
Sadly Lepley’s run of bad luck would continue at the Plains.
George Lepley“We started off well, the car and notes working perfectly, we really enjoyed Dyfnant and was leading the BHRC heading into service”, “Unfortunately in SS5, it appears a small stone got through the air filter and into the turbo, so it was game over!”
Photo: George Lepley & Dafydd Evans | By Andrew Scott
This unfortunate forced retirement would make it three out of three rounds that have resulted in a DNF for Lepley. As the Championship reaches the midpoint with the Argyll Rally on Asphalt in June, where does Lepley go from here?“It’s incredibly frustrating but we don’t give up” Lepley remarked after the event.
With the demise of Lepley, Mennell was promoted to second and Henderson to third. Lepley’s exit would also hand over the Cat4 reigns to Barry Jordan & Arwel Jenkins, who so far this season, have delivered consistent results in their Galant. Proving that you really have to finish the events first, more so with the new category points scoring based system.
But the Plains wasn’t all smooth sailing for Jordan
“The first stage was absolutely terrible, I thought the gearbox was broken twice but we dialed it in a little bit better”
“It’s Getting better, it’s trial and error in this car”, “We’ve just gotta get the confidence in it, we forget that we’ve only done five rallies in it and we are changing it all the time.
Barry Jordan
Unfortunately, the second pass through Dyfnant was cancelled due to earlier mounting delays in the event, which meant that the second pass through Aberhirnant would be the final stage of the event.
Photo: Andrew Purcell & Martin Brady | By Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
Andrew Purcell & Martin Brady would hold an advantage of just seven seconds over Liam Clark & Jack Morton heading into the final 5.63-mile blast through Aberhirnant and the pair would sign off with a final stage win. This increased their overall winning margin to ten seconds over Clark & Morton and would also earn them maximum points in the Welsh Rally Championship. The result for Purcell was a pretty good one, considering both the lack of rallying in Wales and the last-minute decision to sign up for the Plains; it remains to be seen if the Irish pairing will return to the Welsh series in future rounds.
Clark & Morton should still be satisfied with their second step on the podium. With the absent Round 1 winner Russ Thompson, Clark would leave Bala with another good haul of points towards his Welsh Championship campaign, and would now lead the overall standings in the series.
Photos: Liam Clark & Jack Morton | James Giddings & Aled Davies | By Andrew Scott
Despite picking up a puncture on the opening stage of the rally, James Giddings alongside Aled Davies would be the best of the rest, bringing the Mitsubishi EVO IX home in third to round out the podium. All be it some forty-three seconds off the pace of Clark & Morton ahead of them. Giddings was another to take advantage of Thompson’s no-show and would also be leaving Bala with a good amount of Welsh Championship points in the bag.
Turning the attention to the British Historic Rally Championship, there was a bit of a race on to the finish line. David Henderson & Chris Lees would enter the final stage in Aberhirnant trailing David Crossen & Ben Teggart by five seconds, which was not a totally unreasonable ask.
Photo: David Henderson & Chris Lees | By Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
Henderson gave it one last throw of the dice just to apply a bit of pressure to Crossen. Alas, his efforts would only match the time of Crossen, who would indeed secure the victory. The final winning margin for Crossen & Teggart would remain at five seconds and the Plains was to be their second BHRC win of the year thus far.
Photo: David Crossen & Ben Teggart | By Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
“It’s fantastic, it’s been great racing David [Hendserson] all day. It’s been flat out from the go and It’s fantastic to have three guys going at it hammer and tongs all day”
David Crossen
A further eight seconds back from Henderson & Lees, our Round 1 winners Dan Mennell & John Roberts would round out the overall BHRC podium in third.
“Does it get any closer than this? All day it’s been backwards and forwards, it’s just been fantastic”, “That’s me maxed out, I couldn’t go any more without throwing this car into the trees, that’s all I’ve got and it ends up being a good days sport”
Dan Mennell
Photo: Dan Mennell & John Roberts | By Andrew Scott
Crossen’s victory at the Plains, coupled with his win in Carlise and second place at the opening round (The Riponian), puts him in the leads of Cat 3 and second overall (91) ahead of Mennell (83).
Over the afternoon loop of stages, Adam Milner & Roy Javis would remain on course to secure the Category 2 honours, despite having what Adam described as “an eventful day”, driving their Ford MK1 Escort Mexico home the eleventh fastest historic crew (+ H2 Class winners).
Photo: Adam Milner & Roy Jarvis | Nigel Pratt (Black Mountains Media)
After braking a wheel on the opening Alwen South test of the day, Milner then arrived at the mid-day service with a sticking brake caliper. The fix took some time, which meant they were late out of service and running out of place. And to add to the concerns, Milner would again brake a wheel on the same bend in the Alwen South in the afternoon.
However, Milner & Jarvis were still around one minute and twenty-two seconds quicker than their closest Cat 2 rivals, Tim Pearcey & Ifan Davine in the Ford MK1 Escort RS1600 (H3 Class winners).
“I’m ready for a cold bath”, “We just seemed to be chasing ourselves all the way, fixing one thing and fixing another, always rushing to get to the next stage, but we made it to the end”, “I want to be in Argyll, we’ve never been to it and we’ve never done a tarmac event in this (The MK1 Escort Mexico) as the brakes are crap”
Adam Milner
With Lepley out of the picture, Barry Jordan & Arwel Jenkins could ease off and cruise to the finish line in Bala, adding the Plains Rally to their clean sweep of Category 4 wins so far this season. This result keeps them firmly in the hunt in the overall BHRC standings, sitting at the top alongside Milner & Jarvis from Category 2, who also match them on points (96).
“It’s surreal init?”, “I just think it is what it is, it’s how the points are working. It is good, it feels a bit strange but it’s good for the Championship in the long run, I’m sure”, “It takes some getting me head around, but I think for the Championship it’s better, but some days you don’t feel like you are racing but you don’t win Championships crashing do ya?”
Barry Jordan
Photo: Barry Jordan & Arwel Jenkins | By Andrew Scott
FINAL RESULTS
| POS | LEADERBOARD | CLASS | TIME (DIF) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | #25 A.PURCELL / M.BRADY | 1 | 31:56 |
| 2 | #2 L.CLARK / J.MORTON | 1 | 32:06 (+10) |
| 3 | #5 J.GIDDINGS / A.DAVIES | 2 | 32:49 (+43) |
| 4 | #2 M.OBRIEN / N.BURNS | 1 | 33:01 (+12) |
| 5 | #207 D.CROSSEN / B.TEGGART | H8 | 33:52 (+51) |
| 6 | #208 D.HENDERSON / C.LEES | H8 | 33:57 (+5) |
| 7 | #209 D.MENNELL / J.ROBERTS | H8 | 34:00 (+3) |
| 8 | #210 B.FRIEND / C.SIMMONS | H8 | 34:33 (+33) |
| 9 | #8 D.TOMLIN / K.ASHLEY | 1 | 34:43 (+10) |
| 10 | #6 B.MORGAN / A.WILLIAMS | 1 | 34:44 (+1) |
NEXT TIME
Whilst the Welsh Championship will have to wait until mid-July for its next instalment at the Nicky Grist Stages; the British Historic Rally Championship will switch over to tarmac spec for a one-off Asphalt rally on the closed roads at the Argyll Rally in June.
