The Historic Vltava Rally formed the third stage of the FIA European Historic Sporting Rally Championship.  While it was in its 24th edition, the “Vltava” benefitted from the special exposure of the Rally Sumava Klatovy, modern event to which it was the supplement. The “Sumava” celebrated its 50th anniversary this year and also had the privilege of seeing the brand new Skoda Fabia debut in its “R5” version.

The 53 cars entered in the historic rally ran on the same course and were even lucky enough to open the road before of the modern cars, which gave them the occasion to perform in front of a very large audience, in particular during the two special stages marked out in direct proximity to the town centre of Klatovy.

Now authorised in the European Championship, the cars of Group A from Period J2 (years ‘86 to ‘90) were significantly fewer in the Czech Republic than during the previous events in Spain and Italy. And the only top “J2”, the Ford Sierrra RS Cosworth of local Jiri Navratil, retired too early to allow us to gauge its performance in relation to the best Porsche 911s. The German cars proved to be uncompromising in Klatovy, monopolising all the scratch times of the rally.

Although he won fewer special stages than Valter Jensen (5 against 6), Swede Mats Myrsell finished the rally in the lead, with 17 seconds over the Norwegian. Having achieved a better time and classified second after the first five special stages, Swede Anders Johnsen was forced to retire due to a mechanical failure.

His victory in the Vltava Rally allows Mats Myrsell – and his teammate Esko Juntilla – to consolidate their lead in the provisional classification of the Championship in Category 2, where he has 10 points more than Hungarian Laszlo Mekler (Alfa Romeo 1750 GTAm) and 14 points on Valter Jensen.

Third in the general classification in the Czech Republic, Hungarians Ferenc Wirtmann and Gyorgy Barna won with their Ford Escort RS1800 in Category 3.

Like in the Costa Brava and the San Remo, Italian Antonio Parisi went home from Vltava with the 25 points for first place from among the drivers registered in the European Championship in Category 1 and beat the Skoda Fabia and the BMW 2002 of Finns Anttalainen and Nordgaard.

The European Historic Sporting Rally Championship will continue this weekend in Ireland with the Rally of the Lakes.