THE finale of Lance East Exotics Tarmac West delivered thrills, spills and champions with 70 competitors, the biggest field in 12 years.

Rally cars ranged from classics such as 1964 Ford Anglia and 1969 Ford Falcon to modern Subaru WRXs and Mitsubishi Evos to powerful Porsches and electrifying Teslas.

In the open class T200 competition former Gooseberry Hill resident Peter Rullo took his third outright win at the 2026 Lance East Exotics Tarmac West, following wins in 2018 and 2021.

This year he competed in his new 2023 Porsche 992 RGT with Steve Glenney as co-driver, finishing 25 seconds ahead of Heuson Bak and Roger Tan in their 2017 Lotus Exige S 350.

An elated Mr Rullo said it wasn’t an easy win.

“We definitely didn’t do it the easy the way. We made a mistake on the hairpin turn in Kalamunda on Zig Zag when we tried to attempt a handbrake turn and got it wrong and then couldn’t get it into reverse and lost 30 seconds or so there,” he said.

“We had a big slog the next day to try to come back, and unfortunately a few stages were cancelled but we ended up with a win, so we’re happy.”

In the T185 category, introduced this year for modified classics, Byron Ellement and Dean Mclardy in the rally’s oldest car, a 1964 Ford Anglia, led from day one and were never headed. They won all nine day three stages and stretched their margin over Mike Doyle and Brett Hale in a 1991 Subaru Liberty RS over the event.

In the T165 category, partners in the car and partners in life, rookie Simon Brennan and Sylvia Hamerlik maintained their lead in their 2021 BMW M4 to take the class win with a 3:46 minute margin.

The duo also finished the rally in fifth place outright.

In the T130 category, rookie Daniel McGuckin and his father and co-driver Colin McGuckin from Gooseberry Hill maintained their lead in their 1996 Nissan 180sx to finish 23.5 seconds ahead of Gavin Dixon and co-diver Joe Crabtree in their 2021 Toyota GR Yaris.

Rounding out the top three in the T130 class was another father-and-son duo Jack Oehme and Anthony Oehme in their 2014 BMW M235i 3:29 minutes off the leading pace.

The rally’s biggest category T130, with 21 starters including 15 rookies, saw father and son crew Daniel and Colin McGuckin in their 1996 Nissan 180sx, take over the lead on day 2, holding it through day 3, and finishing the marathon day 22.7 seconds ahead of rookies Gavin Dixon and Joe Crabtree in their 2011 Volkswagen Golf, who won five of the nine day 3 stages to McGuckin's four. Jack and Anthony Oehme in their 2014 BMW M235i held third.

In the Time Speed Distance or TSD Teresa and Timonthy Lupton in their 2014 Peugeot 208 GTi finished four days of driving the same stages as rally competitors with the closest time to the set target time.

Peter Hay and Gene Schneider in their 2020 Tesla Model 3 Performance finished in second place.

Former Australian cricketer Brad Hogg and co-driver Lachlan White in their 2016 BMW M140i rounded out the top three.

Full results and up to date information may be found on the Tarmac West website.