Last day of bakha `Volgograd` participants had to pass the same route as one of yesterday’s specials, but in the oppose direction. Last 145 kilometers were deciding in identifying leaders of the rally-raid `Great Steppe – Don`. There weren`t navigation problems as the track had already been rolled the day before. Under the training and test program two crews of KAMAZ-master Team passed the track accurately and without any halts.
After the finish the pilot of crew №300 Airat Mardeev told the journalists: `The track is basically familiar. The section was tough and curvy, it was more suitable for cars. For our truck there were not so many places where we could cut. We were driving at our own pace. All was excellent with the suspension and the transmission! The suspension performed very well: during the whole race we didn`t break a single shock absorber. It`s very important for us, because it was interesting to check the resource of their endurance. Everything was fine with the transmission too: automatic gearbox showed itself from the positive side. No problems, no overheat, everything is working! Well, we may need to look for some more settings to prepare the truck for the Silk Way Rally better. How do I get used to the new box? We just use the principle of the automatic box, but I switch gears myself, we don`t drive in an automatic mode. We have the kind of sequential gearbox, but for trucks. Now there is a good tendency and leaders in the truck category start trying something interesting. And the automatic gearbox is one of these decisions`.
In the absence of rivalry first and second places of KAMAZ-master in T4 category were quite predictable. But after three days of the race Airat Mardeev’s crew (navigator D. Svistunov, mechanic A. Galyautdinov) and Anton Shabalov’s crew (navigator D. Nikitin, mechanic I. Romanov) took second and fifth positions respectively in the general standings of competition, letting forward with a minimum gap only jeeps of A. Novikov (first place in the race), A. Cherkesov (third place) and A. Gadasin (fourth place).
