About the race
The race organisers provided contestants with great impressions from the very beginning. A pre-start briefing, as well as technical checks, were held in Astrakhan Opera and Ballet Theatre. All people gathered at the briefing in the main hall of the theatre were met with the concert of Astrakhan ensemble and a promo-video of the upcoming race, which dipped the participants into a magic atmosphere of the next week. This year the rally will consist of 7 stages and the main novelty is a marathon stage, starting on the second day of the race. The crews won’t be able to receive help of the night mechanics, only crew members will be allowed for repair. Those who have been in Astrakhan steppes, firsthand know that these are one of the most difficult and unpredictable routes, ruthless for mistakes, therefore the race promises to be intriguing!
About rivals
The main rivals of KAMAZ this year pretend to be MAZ team, which applied 4 crews and Renault team, which leader Martin Van Den Brink has always been ambitious and assertive. At the morning pre-start press conference, the Dutch told that the main changes for his team became renewal of his crew composition, on the race his co-pilot will be his son. “Last year Silk Way was unlucky for us – we withdrew on the fourth special due to technical reasons. This year we did a lot of work and ready for rivalry with such strong teams”, - said the racer. Also in the truck category will start crews GAZ Raid sport, HINO and MAN.
About the ceremonial start
Under the storm of applause the ceremonial race start was opened by famous racer Nasser Al Attiyah on Toyota. First among trucks on the podium appeared the winner of last year Silk Way Rally Dmitry Sotnikov, after him went a bonnet truck Eduard Nikolaev, the third – truck of Sergey Vyazovich. The last truck on the podium drove already in the dark, but the same as the first, it was met with thunderous applause and encouraging shouts of the fans. Right after start vehicles were driven to the enclosure and already tomorrow they will start the first stage.
P.S.
Information note for spectators to recognize trucks on the photo and broadcasting:
You can distinguish Dmitry Sotnikov’s truck by red stickers on rear-view mirrors. Also Dmitry’s truck has a new configuration: the cab is a bit displaced forward, there are changes in the cab and bumper.
On this race Sergey Kuprianov’s truck is responsible for ecology, therefore you can easily recognize this truck by bright green sides and inscription Eco Gas.
Due to black color it is not difficult to see the truck of Eduard Nikolaev. By the way, it is not the only peculiarity – you won’t mix it with any other KAMAZ due to a bonnet configuration.
Devoted fans of KAMAZ-master will distinguish truck of Anton Shibalov upon reliable, well-known to all pevious model KAMAZ-4326. Most difficult will be to distinguish truck of Andrey Karginov and Airat Mardeev, in this case the best would be to rely upon intuition and trying to read race numbers.
