At APRC Rally Whangarei 2009 young Australian Brendan Reeves turned up in a borrowed car on an event he’d competed in only once and finished on the podium.

On the top step was kiwi Haydon Paddon who went onto become the Asia-Pacific entry in the 2010 World Rally Championship Pirelli Star Driver competition and next was Australian Cody Crocker who won the Asia Pacific Rally Championship 4 times. Reeves finished third in 2009 and ahead of this year’s APRC points leader Katsu Taguchi from Japan.

Returning to Rally Whangarei in 2010 Reeves has entered the event as part of an APRC Pacific Cup campaign that will take him and codriving sister Rhiannon Smyth to Rally Queensland and Rally New Caledonia “I really want to move my rally career onto the international stage and this is the first step – an amazing opportunity and I will be driving at my best to take out first place”.

Reeves will be taking on two rally veterans Brian Green from New Zealand and Jean-Louis Leyraud from New Caledonia who are also entered in the Pacific Cup. While both drivers are nearly three times his age, their vast experience of the three events is not to be under-estimated and Reeves is well aware both are former champions and said ” the best advice I was ever give was “To finish first, first you must finish” and that will be my strategy”.

Driving a Subaru Impreza Sti, Reeves will be keen to impress and hopefully secure sponsors for a full APRC campaign in 2011.