The route was split into twelve Standard Sections, with one timed to the second as a tie breaker. These were linked by Regularity Sections rather than more usual neutrals. This is a method that has become traditional on the Red Dragon and meant that crews were unable to relax throughout the event as late arrival at the end of a Regularity Section would incur penalty; the only respite was the halfway halt. Route definition was by six figure map references and route cards were issued at the start of each Standard Section.
There were problems at scrutineering as crews, who had them, were made to remove hydraulic handbrakes. In addition there was a dispute over the eligibility for the Production Class of the Toyota Corollas running 185 tyres; they were finally allowed to run. It has since been proved that these tyres were fitted to Corollas as standard.
The first half used the majority of lanes in the triangle formed by the main roads linking Fishguard, Haverfordwest and St Davids. A number of crews emerged penalty free, but others had hit problems. Eventual joint winners Williams/Bowen sat in both camps, as they lost three minutes after drowning out in the Brandy Brook ford but still managed to clean the section.
Less fortunate were Paul Holmberg/Maurice Leach who lost eight minutes when their Escort suffered a broken throttle cable, they recovered to take 16th overall. In similar problems were Wayne Evans/Neil Spiers who survived the first half without penalty and were in third place when they were stranded after both throttle cables broke on their Escort.
Welsh Championship regular Sarah Harmer was being navigated by 1995 London Counties Champion Cath Woodman, who was doing her first Welsh event. The ladies would have finished fifth overall but for missing the code board at PC21. Despite this both thoroughly enjoyed the event and felt the 600 mile round trip was well worth the effort. Another crew who missed the same board were Dennis Quinn/Nick Darkin, they were free of time penalties until dropping 39 seconds when they picked up a puncture on the tie breaking selective in the second half, this would have given them third overall but the missed code board plunged them down to 37th.
Also in trouble early on were the winners of the first two rounds of the Welsh Championship, Richard Lewis/Phil Pugh in their Toyota Corolla. They dropped three minutes on the very first section when they wrong slotted while plotting, they then lost another two minutes while hunting for the non-existent code board at PC11. They eventually finished 17th overall which was enough to keep them in the lead of the Welsh Championship but with a slightly reduced cushion to Baron Glaze/Dave Pitchford who finished fifth. This result was enough to maintain Glaze/Pitchford's lead in the West Midland Championship.
The second half moved to the east of the A40 and took in the area bordered on the north by the Preseli Mountains and on the south by the Haverfordwest to Narbeth road. The very first section was the three and a half mile tie breaker timed to the second. However the tie breaker wasn't entirely successful as both Williams/Bowen's Sunbeam 2.0 and Davies/Thomas' Corolla 1.6 cleaned it. At the finish it would have been possible to use differing engine capacity to decide the winner, however the officials declared a draw as it was felt this rule was difficult to enforce given the fact that the Toyota was a twin-cam.
The result made it a double for Andy Bowen who won last year's event partnering Malcolm Walters. It was Tony Davies' first rally win and, with his second place on the Rali Bro Caron, it puts him in a strong position in the Welsh Championship. For his navigator, Ieaun Thomas, it was a welcome return to rallying after a 18 month lay off. Tony's regular navigator, Rob Richardson, was unavailable for the event due to his impending fatherhood! The first five places were decided by the single selctive with the third to fifth place crews only dropping time on that single section. Elgan Jones/Byron Jones dropped 41 seconds, with Lloyd Evans/Mike Roach only 9 seconds further back. Glaze/Pitchford dropped 1.11 as the driver took it steadily through the Quiet Zone in the middle of the section. Sixth place John Evans/Eurig Evans only dropped 15 seconds but had already picked up a minutes penalty in the first half when a marshal entered the wrong time on their card.
Barry and Phil Luxton led home the South Western Championship contenders with seventh overall. They were a minute and a half ahead of ninth placed Stuart Wood/Paul Waterton in their Sierra Estate.
The Semi-Expert class was won by a massive margin by Des Phasey/Paul Middleton, the first time pairing had a clear run bar for having to disconnect the spotlights to allow a failing battery to make it to the finish; they finished 12th overall with total penalties of 8.06. Second in the class were Stephen Williams/Ian Taylor, they'd started slowly but speeded up in the second half to take 26th overall. Mario Mangano/Steve Weston, who had held second in class at petrol, had a number of wrong slots after the break and dropped to fourth at the end only 11 seconds behind Gareth Evans/Dylan Evans.
Ian Evans/David Evans won the Novice class by almost 28 minutes despite a down on power engine and the fact that on the day before the rally the driver was without a navigator for the event. In total there were 86 starters with 64 being classified as finishers.
RESULTS
Ian Mills 10th April 1996