Tulpenrallye 1991

The story of 1991: After the financial problems of 1990, the AMAC was nevertheless able to organise a Tulpenrallye once again. This year, too, it looked for a long time as though the budget would not balance, until the four importers with the greatest interests in Dutch rallying decided to support the event financially. This year the municipality of Barneveld was actually paid by the organisers for the deployment of police and other services. John Bosch was contesting mainly the European Rally Championship this year, but had decided at an early stage to start in the Tulpenrally as well. The other Dutch starters were Erwin Doctor (Opel), Jan van der Marel (Ford), Theo Knoop (Peugeot), Henk Vossen (BMW) and Chiel Bos (Lancia). The most important foreign entries were the Finnish Ford drivers Juha Miettinen and Jussi Makinen, both contesting the Dutch championship this year with a Ford Sierra Cosworth, and Jen Ole Kristiansen with a Peugeot 405 Mi.16. The rally had sixteen special tests covering ‘only’ 130 km in total. Two days before the rally two AROB procedures brought by local residents were still pending, but these were declared inadmissible. The cars went through scrutineering on the Friday evening, during which the police also carried out a special check on the papers of the cars and drivers. The start this year was at seven o’clock in the morning. Once again De Vlasakkers could not be run in its entirety and was limited to the Amersfoort section. Several tens of thousands of spectators had gathered at the finish section of the Soesterberg special test (this one was also run over closed military ground, but the final stretch was accessible). This forced the organisers to shorten the route for the second run at Soesterberg by some way. The famous closing test on the Harselaar in Barneveld was not included in the route, because the organisers considered the cost of the police deployment on that test too high. John Bosch took the lead straight away on the first test and won the second as well. On the third test Bosch had to wait a little longer before the start, which allowed his tyres to cool down (the BMW team worked with tyre warmers). He went off the road shortly after the start and lost 30 seconds when the spectators present had to lift the BMW out of the ditch. The young Chiel Bos then took over the lead, but had to retire a few tests later with a broken engine. Jan van der Marel then held first place. Unfortunately, on De Vlasakkers he once again ran into the Tulpenrallye bad luck he had met several times in recent years, when his front differential broke. So Bosch and Gormley moved back into the lead and did not surrender it again. For Erwin Doctor a high placing mattered for the Dutch Championship. With his Opel Kadett he could not match the sheer force of Bosch’s BMW and Miettinen’s Ford Sierra Cosworth, but third place was of great importance to him. Unfortunately he could not keep up with the Danish champion Jörgen Nielsen, driving an identical car. Because Nielsen drove for the Danish dealer organisation, team orders followed to help Doctor to third place. Nielsen stopped for a few seconds on the final test, allowing Doctor to pass him in the final classification. Bosch thus won his fourth Tulpenrallye. Miettinen was second, followed by Erwin Doctor. Eddy van den Hoorn was the winner of the national class. The prize-giving was again held on the Sunday in Hoevelaken.