Special section Cheboksary-Ufa wasn’t easy for the pilots from Naberezhnye Chelny city. Judging by the dirty look of the vehicles at the finish line, it was easy to understand that the stage was different from the previous one only with length. Yesterday’s heavy rains made the situation even more difficult, and many teams had the only target – to reach the finish line.
As it was expected, Peugeot Sport Team showed a good teamwork and a good performance, taking first three positions in their category, where Stephane Peterhansel was first, Cyril Despres and Sebastien Loeb took second and third positions with the gap of 1 min 47 sec and 1 min 48 sec respectively. The closest to them Russian Team "BFCEC SPORT" placed only on the thirteenth place with the gap of 44 min and 42 sec.
MAZ Team also were not lucky on this special: Siarhei Viazovich, leading on some waypoints, lost around an hour before the finish line, and thus took only 11th position. The youngest pilot of the team Aliaksei Vishneuski couldn’t keep his vehicle on the track and laid on its side. The similar situation happened to Pascal de Baar’s truck (Riwald Dakar Team). Ales Loprais also has to drop out of the game due to technical problems.
On today’s special van den Brink was the best among trucks, with Gerard de Rooy following him, and the third was Artur Ardavicius. Among KAMAZ trucks first to the finish line came Anton Shibalov, with 4-min gap from the leader, after 57 sec just after him goes Dmitry Sotnikov, and Airat Mardeev, with the gap of 7 min 13 sec from the leader. Eduard Nikolaev took 10thposition, 23 min 28 sec behind the leader.
Today trucks of Airat Mardeev and Eduard Nikolaev faced problems with wind-screen wipers. Their misfunction can influence greatly the speed, and even to the full stop.
Straight after the special the sportsmen headed for the liaison to Ufa, which went through the native city of KAMAZ-master Naberezhnye Chelny. Their relatives and friends came to wish good luck to the sportsmen. Their sincere support will definitely enforce the team for victory!
Quotations:
Airat Mardeev: “It is very muddy, very slippery, somewhere it is like a swamp, extremely difficult to drive but everyone is in equal conditions. In the middle of the special our wind-screen wipers just broke down and we had to drive blindly. We didn’t have spare parts. I trusted my navigator 100%. And we did it. We were driving not seeing anything. A lot of trucks were standing on the special, a difficult day, sometimes rainy, but it’s all right”, - told Mardeev to the journalists. “Everyone faced with difficulties. MAZ fell on its side, one of the leaders, Alrahji, was in the ditch. There was a terrible hole, that was not in the legend”, - added the pilot.
Anton Shibalov: “Today’s special turned out more challenging than yesterday’s one: longer, more muddy, more unpredictable. It’s very slippery, you could see that a lot of sportsmen faced with this problem. We saw how Alrahji fell into the ditch, then we saw Renault on its side. There were many dangerous ravines, where vehicles were just pulled down, plenty of slippery, curvy roads. We drove very accurately trying to save our truck in order to bring less work to the bivouac”.
RESULTS OF THE SECOND STAGE
1. Maarten VAN DEN BRINK (Mammoet Rallysport Renault) – 2ч09:45
2. Gérard DE ROOY (De Rooy Iveco) +2:04
3. Artur ARDAVICIUS (Astana De Rooy Iveco) +3:17
4. Anton SHIBALOV (КАМАЗ-мастер) +4:00
5. Dmitry SOTNIKOV (КАМАЗ-мастер) +4:57
GENERAL CLASSIFICATION
1. Maarten VAN DEN BRINK (Mammoet Rallysport Renault) – 3ч05:20
2. Gérard DE ROOY (De Rooy Iveco) +0:13
3. Artur ARDAVICIUS (Astana De Rooy Iveco) +1:31
4. Anton SHIBALOV (КАМАЗ-мастер) +2:26
5. Martin KOLOMY (Tatra Buggyra Racing) +5:38
