Fallen archway won't change routeposted in RSCOT09 | 10 | 2010

    JUST DAYS before RallyScotland, the penultimate round of the Intercontinental Rally Championship, gets underway, organisers have confirmed the open stage has not been affected by the accident which destroyed a 400-year-old archway at Scone Palace (pictured).

    The palace, near Perth, will host the opening two special stages in its grounds on Friday evening. But there were fears the route would have to be changed after the historic archway was demolished by an errant van driver a few days ago.

    "We've had stonemasons and historic architects check what remains of the archway and we've been given the green light to use the route, just as we did last year," Scott Galloway, Perth regional organiser of RallyScotland said today.

    "It's amazing to think we had all the high-speed rally cars race underneath the archway, which was built in 1590, twice each last year and it survived. Then it gets demolished by a careless van driver whose van was simply to high to get through.

    "If, for some reason, we have to change the route at the last minute, we have a back-up plan for the stage, but certainly at the moment we don't have any intention of deviating from our original route."

    The three-day rally, which heads into the forest stages near Perth next Saturday before blasting through the Trossachs next Sunday before finishing at Stirling Castle.

    Finn Juha Hanninen is poised to clinch the championship for Skoda but faces stiff opposition from the Peugeot of last year's champion Kris Meeke, the Skoda last year's RallyScotland winner Guy Wilks and the Proton of Lanark's Alister McRae.

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    Jim McGill

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