Three punctures ends Armstrong's hopes of podium finish
Jon Armstrong had to settle for fourteenth overall on Rally Hungary, after three punctures ended his hopes of a podium finish.
The Fermanagh driver was holding third overall and had just set his first ever fastest stage time on gravel in the European Rally Championship when he hit problems and plummeted down the leaderboard.
Despite the disappointing overall placing, Jon came away from the event hopeful for the rest of the season.
'It was nice to be able to be on the pace right from the pre practice and the qualifying,' he said.
'I hadn't done a gravel rally since last July, so it was a bit of an unknown, but it was good to know we have taken a step forward there.
"We knew the tarmac pace is quite good but we didn't know how the gravel would be.
"It was just a bit frustrating whenever we know we could have been on the podium, because every stage where we didn't have a puncture, we had a top three time.
"The fact the pace is consistently good is a positive thing to have. If we can just keep chipping away, hopefully a solid result will be around the corner.'
Jon's early pace had elevated him to third place after four stages, and he followed that up with a joint fastest time on stage five, but disaster struck on the sixth test as he suffered two separate punctures.
'We had a strong first loop lying third,' he said.
'The first stage out on the second loop on the Saturday, we were joint fastest and we were closing in on second but then on stage six we got a puncture and stopped and changed it, and then got another puncture on the same wheel and we had to stop and change again.
"The tyre starts to flail very quickly and you risk damaging an electrical component or the damper or the brake line, and it was still quite far to the end of the stage, so we had to stop.'
That dropped Jon down to a lowly 25th, and his climb back up the table was stalled again on the final day with another puncture.
'It is based in a military area and the stages have a lot of bedrock sticking out and are quite rough,' he explained.
'We had another puncture on the first run through the power stage, stage ten. Again, it was a bit of bedrock and we had to stop and change.
"It was all really done at that stage anyway, but it was still annoying to have them. It obviously affected our position.'
Next up for Jon is the Rally of Scandinavia at the end of this month, quickly followed by Rally Poland, and Jon is hopeful he can turn his season around.
'If I could get a podium in Scandinavia I would be very happy, but there will be more Scandinavians turning up for that,' he said.
'It will be my third year doing it, so I have to use that experience and really go for it. Poland is a gravel rally, fast and more sandy, and is one of my favourite gravel rallies, so I am really looking forward to that. It is a great challenge.'
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