KAMAZ-MASTER KEEPS LEADING POSITIONS IN THE TRUCK CATEGORY OF THE RALLY “DAKAR-2019”

15 January, Pisco

The 363-kilometer special section on the stage Marcona-Pisco partially went along the route of the second rally day’s special. Old tracks made navigation difficult. The stage began with solid, hardly seen roads, turning into impassibility, stone areas and even a trial. On the 159^th kilometer there was a 800-meter neutralization zone, and from the 170^th kilometer contestants were awaited by a 70-kilometer dune section, and after a 30-km respite along relatively hard roads, there were the dunes again, complicated by taking navigation points in hard-to-reach places.

On today’s stage Marcona - Pisco, leading groups in the moto (10 crews), car (10 crews) and truck categories (5 crews) started 2 hours earlier than other contestants. As planned by the rally organizers, this was to deprive the leading sportsmen of support of teammates, starting later. Unfortunately, yesterday’s results scattered the crews of E. Nikolaev and D. Sotnikov in different groups. Eduard Nikolaev started in the top five in the company with the Belarusian Siarhei Viazovich (MAZ) and three (!) Iveco of Gerard De Rooy’s team (Gerard de Rooy himself, Federico Villagra and Maurik van den Heuvel). Although very soon after the start one of Gerard de Rooy’s team members  Maurik van den Heuvel laid on the side in the sands, it was still psychologically easier for the Dutch to go, realizing that his colleagues were “covering” him. De Rooy, taking advantage of this, further increased the pace today.

Nikolaev had no one to rely on. In case of an emergency situation, help from started later Sotnikov’s crew would have come not earlier than in two hours and a half. And unfortunately, this situation really happened.

 “Today, unfortunately, we were very unlucky,” said Eduard Nikolaev after the finish.

- In the first dunes we got stuck heavily, dug up, lost a lot of time, because there were no our crews. We had to do only on our own. A little to the left got stuck the crew of Siarhei Viazovich from Belarus. He miraculously left on his own. But he did not risk driving up to us. Our truck sat on the axles horizontally.”Puffy” sand. Two Iveco overdrove us. We were digging up for about 55 minutes, then continued to move. Further in the dunes we were driving very carefully, because the dunes were tough, dangerous, unpredictable. There were places where we had to reverse, go out looking around, as we were surrounded by complex reliefs with deep sinks. It was better to do so than to fall on the side. Nobody would have raised us there.”

Siarhei Viazovich also said that he was stuck at about the same place where Nikolaev’s crew was standing: “After the beach, the organizers made a course into the dunes. De Rooy did not go, drove around sideways. There was a ridge of sand, the arrow led right through it. We headed there, there was a step and a plateau, rising a little, very soft. We stood on this plateau and Edik as well. It was impossible to help him there, because we were hardly climbing in the first gear on the soft sand. He was digging, having an automatic transmission. We just “caught” 10 minutes before the finish of the first part of the special. The second part we passed well. We made a couple of small mistakes in navigation, but not significant. One time we pulled out de Roy, he was skidding at our trajectory. There was no way around his truck. We pulled him out and drove ahead of him.”

The crew of Dmitry Sotnikov rehabilitated for yesterday’s unlucky day for him, showing the best time on today’s stage: “We tried to go at a good pace. On the first part of the special stage before neutralization we drove for a long time because of the fog and lost to the leaders, - already at the bivouac told Dmitry Sotnikov.

- On neutralization there was some confusion with the start to the second part of the special stage. But still we waited for our turn, started and continued going on the stage. We caught up a lot, therefore it was easier to navigate. The dunes were psychologically difficult. But then I even began to enjoy driving on them."

The specifics of the stage from the navigator’s point of view were described by another member of the crew No 514, Dmitrii Nikitin: “At the very start of the stage, due to heavy fog, we had to be cautious. When the fog cleared, we went to the coast and from there took our usual good pace. We took all the navigation points. The most important thing was to hold the course in the sands. Changes of altitude, changes of direction in high dunes, where visibility is limited ... We had to take them and at the same time not to stray from the course. In the second group it was a bit easier to drive. Traces were visible. It was easier to find the correct trajectory of difficult sections. ”

After a hard day KAMAZ-master crews retained the first and second lines in the general classification, although they changed positions in it. Now it is led by the crew of Dmitry Sotnikov. The crew of Eduard Nikolaev follows him with a gap of 26 minutes 49 seconds. Gerard de Rooy managed to reduce the gap today from the Russians (now he loses 1 hour 07 minutes 43 seconds). There are still two full heavy competition days in the dunes ahead. Tomorrow the race contestants are awaited by a 311-kilometer loop section Pisco-Pisco.

TRUCK CATEGORY. CLASSIFICATION OF STAGE 8

   TRUCK CATEGORY. GENERAL CLASSIFICATION AFTER STAGE 8.