Africa Race. Elizabeth Jacinto's good luck

02.01.2013
Africa is incomparable. Where else we can see such canyons filled with sharp stones of volcanic rocks, cliffs, not just with steep walls, but also with prominent teeth at the body level on one side and a precipice on the other side, dunes more than 300 meters. The total length of the special stages is not much less than on "Dakar", but it is necessary to pass them for much shorter period of time. Africa teaches dispassionately and rigidly. Distances are immense and it is difficult to rely on strike of luck.

But at Sonangol Africa Eco Race such lucks could happen. There is talk that here is team spirit at this race - the basic principle. Today at the special stage for 50 kilometers before the finish Elizabeth Jacinto had luck. The renowned Portuguese racer who loves and knows the Moroccan tracks inside out and the most famous racers say that here it is very difficult to compete with her; she hazardously fought for superiority with our crew. She has increased the pace that even jeeps looked on her background, as they were in slow motion movie. She is certainly a brilliant woman. I would like to have such abilities. But nobody is guaranteed from mistakes, especially on such long high-speed section. For 50 km to the finish MAN of Elizabeth had an accident. By this time she won back at KAMAZ guys about 10 minutes, she overtook them for 70 km before the accident. Ours constantly saw her ahead, there was too much dust so that they had to give up maneuvers and let her go. On a winding section the guys could simply pass on other trajectory and not see the wrecked truck. The picture was impressive, they stopped immediately. They had to conduct recovery operations using their own equipment –Elizabeth's crew hadn't even strap for towing. When the situation was redressed, MAN resumed movement, and our guys took off after all equipment was collected.
Elizabeth was very lucky. I hope that her luck will not cost much to our crew. The race headquarters took the situation according the regulations, and we are waiting for classification with amended corrections. But it could not have been otherwise, this is Africa.

Svetlana Klimova