May 21, Volgograd region
Archeda-Don sand massif, the northernmost desert of Russia, spread out on vast territories between the Don river, Medveditsa and Archeda. The total area of huge sand areas is more than 200 000 hectares. From the east the sands are bounded by the federal highway Moscow – Volgograd, and from the west – by the Don river.
A half-desert landscape spreads from the Medveditsa river to the south, where smoothly turns into the desert and further gets stuck to the Don flood-plain forest.
Somewhere among the sandy barchans you can meet real swamps with fern brushwood and squelching through the peat. Archeda swamps are the southernmost real swamps on the Russian plain. This happens due to its nearness of the subsoil waters to the upper layer of the ground, as well as springs bursting forth out of the foothills. The biggest part of the territory of Archeda-Don sands is taken by bumpy small dunes, chaotically thrown around.
Passed on the 20th of May prologue of the race has placed the trucks in today’s starting list according to yesterday results. First to the 240-kilometer SS entered Belarusian crews of Alexey Vishevsky and Sergey Vyazovich. They estimated driving on the sands, not ploughed by the main peloton yet, at the highest rate. The race organizers tried to use sand massifs, that are at their disposal, to the full, therefore the track configuration consisted of three loops of approximately 80 kilometers in length. And every return to the sands more and more loaded engines and suspension. The race bivouac, which crews could enter after every circle, gave some relief to the contestants. There they had limited in time technical service and a break.
Alexey Vishevsky from the Belarusian team MAZ-SPORTauto, who made a good claim for the lead in the race, set the pace in the beginning of today’s special section as well. But it grabbed their mechanics too much time to solve the problem (pneumatic compressor breakdown) at the service point, that didn’t allow them to keep within the so called T-maximum (time limit between two specials). This fact didn’t leave a chance to the talented Belarusian racer to fight for the lead.
Andrey Karginov also had some time loss on the stage. At first the crew felt some loss in power, as it turned up, because the brake pedal fell literally for a few millimeters. It is one more proof to test rebuilt trucks on training sessions and local competitions. This breakdown hardly influenced much on the final Karginov’s result, going in a very good pace. But already on the first circle a navigation mistake led to the loss of about 17 minutes. The MAZ crew of Sergey Vyazovich who kept the truck of Andrey Karginov in sight and chose it as a reference point, repeated the navigation mistake and also lost on it.
On the other hand, three KAMAZ racers Airat Mardeev, Sergei Kuprianov and Bogdan Karimov were quite satisfied by their results. Experienced Mardeev, who caught up with Karimov’s crew on the first circle, didn’t hide his excitement of his young teammate drive, remarked his smart cuts and work in dunes. After a quite long break in competitions, Airat himself drove this stage in the good tone, raising the pace from circle to circle.
Sergei Kuprianov, for whom Archeda Baja became the first competition in the season, sees it as a preparation for the Silk Way Rally, upcoming in July. The main task is to drive in a reliable way, gradually increasing the pace. The navigator of the crew Aleksandr Kuprianov made a joke that he was a bit bored on the second loop when the wheel tread became a kind of note of the right direction. On the other hand, the mechanic of the gas-and-diesel KAMAZ Sergei Krenev was quite satisfied because during the stage he didn’t have to remove any breakdowns and technical problems.
