The tenth round of the 2011 Intercontinental Rally Challenge, RACMSA Rally of Scotland, was held on October 7-9, using the roads in Scotland, in the northern part of Great Britain, as its stage. Two star drivers from Japan, Toshihiro Arai and Fumio Nutahara, entered this second gravel rally of the season so far with their Subaru WRX STI R4s.

The rally was based at Perth, one of the historic towns in Scotland, and the stages were arranged in the forest areas around the city. The average speed through the gravel roads was really fast because the stages contained a lot of medium to high speed corners. On top of this, the roads were generally narrow and had twisted blind crests everywhere. The rally weekend was hit by rain, so the surfaces were very slippery but the two ADVAN supported drivers from Japan were quite confident about their preparation.

They decided not to run in the Shakedown session in the early evening of Thursday as the nature of the route was so different from that of proper rally stages. But the car set up work had already been done during the pre-event testing on the day before and both Arai and Nutahara had confirmed the WRX STI R4's consistent performance. Therefore, the expectations for their best result this season were high.

Rally of Scotland got under way with the ceremonial start in front of Stirling Castle, in the southwest of Perth, in the early evening of Friday. After leaving the start ramp, Arai and Nutahara moved to the forested area to tackle the two night stages of Leg 1. While the results in those stages in the dark were modest, their performances in Leg 2 on Saturday were much better.

Despite having limited vision due to a failure of windscreen defroster, Arai finished the first three stages of the day, Stage 3 to 5, in 15th, 13th and 12th respectively with a rising pace. Under the difficult conditions with continuous rain from the morning, he again took the 14th and 13th places in the next two stages, SS6 and 7, to end the leg in 12th overall, as the last stage of the day, Stage 8, was cancelled due to heavy rain and fog.

On the other hand, Nutahara struggled quite a bit because he had never driven WRX STI R4 on the muddy surfaces before but he also moved up the position gradually, by finishing the first three stages of Leg 2 in 23rd, 20th and 17th. Then he wasn't able to make progress in the next two stages and finished both SS6 and 7 in 19th due to an unsatisfactory fine tuning of the car set up but his steady drive still led to an 18th place overall at the end of Leg 2.

Amid such a seesaw situation, however, the two Japanese aces stayed away from any major mistakes in the stages and were able to raise their pace in Leg 3 on Saturday, the rally's final day. The weather was improving on Saturday but the roads were still very wet and muddy. But Arai registered the tenth fastest time in SS9, the first stage of the day and had the upper hand over the local Group N cars and a several S2000 cars as well. In Stage 10, however, his car hit hard against the road surface when the car landed on it after a crest, which messed up the car's wheel alignment. He finished the stage in tenth but, then, he hit a rock in SS11 and broke a tire, resulting in lowly 26th place in this stage. But, after fixing the wheel alignment at the remote service, the ex-PWRC champion bounced back for the second run of the loop, SS12 and 13, in which he was tenth and 11th on the time sheet.

Arai carried his momentum during the last forest stages to the final two runs on the same route in the Scone Palace park, Stage 14 and 15, and finished them in 11th and eighth, displaying a burst of his speed in the rally-closing short stages. Thanks to his much improved pace in Leg 3, Arai finished the rally in ninth overall and earned his first points in the IRC series. At the same time, he became the first Japanese winner of the Production Cup.

Meanwhile, Nutahara was forced to pause his progress because the suspension set up change overnight didn't work. He finished SS9 in 18th but the things got worse for him, as he hit a big stone in Stage 10 and badly damaged a tire, which led to the lowly 33rd place in the stage.

But Nutahara didn't give up and gradually regained his pace through the forest stages, SS11 to 13. Then he displayed a matured flowing drive in the final two short stages in the park and ended the rally with the 15th fastest stage time in Stage 15, which was his best result in this event. By completing all the stages with his persistent drive, Nutahara was awarded the 15th place overall in the rally which saw not a few retirement even from the leading crews. Also he was third in the Production Cup, which meant the ADVAN equipped cars took the two out of top 3 places in the Cup

Besides the two Japanese drivers, three more ADVAN shoed cars competed in this rally. Among them, Jarkko Nikara from Finland performed particularly well.

Nikara was leading the fight for the Production Cup with a Group N specification Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX and was the fourth fastest in Stage 11, outperforming many S2000 cars, and running in sixth overall. Then he was forced to retire by a course off in Stage 13 but his outstanding performance earned the Colin McRae IRC Flat Out Trophy which is given to the most impressive young driver. It certainly was another proof of the superb performance of ADVAN rally tires.

　[Result : 9th]
"We had 'all those things' during Leg 1 and 2 but still managed to drive faster than the local Group N cars and secure the ninth place in the end. Without those things, we should have finished in a higher place but it was good to win the Production Cup anyway.
"We had spent a long time before finding out a good basic set up this year. But now the set up of R4 spec car finally came close to a satisfactory level and we were able to keep consistent pace regardless of the surface conditions, thanks to a significant improvement in tires. We will try our best in the final round, Cyprus Rally, which is the mixed surface event, as our car and tires are getting better and better."

　[Result : 15th]
"Things looked good in the pre-event testing on Wednesday. But the stages were more difficult than I expected because there were a lot of crests and the speed was very high, just like Rally Finland. Also there were so many stones and rocks on the roads and the surfaces were very slippery throughout Leg 1 and 2. Even in Leg 3, the set up change we did on the suspension turned out to be wrong in Stage 9 and I have to admit I just drove safely in the stages after that. Generally, I wasn't able to push as hard as I wished throughout the rally.
"Nevertheless, it was good to complete in such a tough rally without major trouble and the tires have been improved very much, as the traction and the feel of road holding has been enhanced. I would like to build on this experience for my rallying activities in future."

"The tires we used for this event were the improved model to address the issues we had found in the sixth round, Rallye Acores. With this model, we had aimed for the enhanced ability to cope with a broader variation of weather and surface conditions. Two types of compounds, medium and soft, were available but both Arai and Nutahara used the soft compound with maximum grooving because the surfaces were basically wet throughout the weekend.
"In the third leg, both of our drivers experienced tire breakages, supposedly as the result of hitting a rock on the road. They reported that a lot of stones and rocks were scattered about and those hadn't been there at the time they had made pace notes. Since the other tire manufacturers also had the same problems, I think it can be considered as condition-induced problems in this particular event.
"It was quite a tough rally but our drivers registered relatively good stage times and they reported good feelings about the tires, so I would say the tires performed as well as intended in our development objectives. This was the second gravel event for us and we were able to confirm both our cars and tires have certainly been improved."