A stellar Saturday drive stitched up the Tasmanian Rally Championship round on Sunday for Tim Auty and co-driver Jon Mitchell.
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"We did end up doing a whole lot better than we thought we would," he said.
Auty finished the 108.41km course in one hour and 17 minutes to push ahead of lead rival Kurt Wylie.
A better Sunday would consolidate second place in TRC standings for the Subaru WRX Sti with Damien Roach behind the wheel with Wylie.
That audacious comeback was also coupled with Auty's mysterious car mishaps.
The race leader was forced to pull over for three and a half minutes to try and work out an unattributed noise coming from his drivetrain.
That time he lost almost handed the win over to Wylie.
Not even discovering a missing bolt on the second last stage could halt the two-point victory minutes before finishing the 17 stages that had included Auty's Friday night's Super Special sprint.
"To win the state round, I was quite surprised. The last stage when we fixed the bolt, we went flat out to try and make sure we held the lead over Wylie," Auty said.
The Tarleton driver did not finish the opening round and got stuck in a tree in the next to ultimately harm his chances after falling eight points shy by season's end.
But Wylie, who resides up the road in Devonport, was far from disappointed over what could have been.
"Second outright in the Tasmanian rally championship round three?" Wylie said on social media, "pretty happy with that after all the troubles we have had with the car in recent years."
Launceston driver Ben Newman with Adam Kudra finished well back in third place overall ahead of interstate duo Daniel Traverso and Andy Sarandis.
Newman had capped off a great weekend, also taking out the Subaru RS Challenge ahead of the same pair in the 10-car field.
Launceston pair Crichton Lewis and Anthony Carr rounded out the podium.