Success in the Mud | Safari Rally Kenya

The Kenya Rally is traditionally very demanding, and this year that was further emphasized by the rain and the resulting muddy roads. This makes the success of the Škoda crews all the more impressive. The victory in the WRC2 category went to Estonian driver Robert Virves, who finished fifth overall. Fabrizio Zaldivar took third place. Other crews also succeeded, demonstrating, among other things, the great durability of the Mladá Boleslav-built cars.

The Estonian crew of Robert Virves and Jakko Viilo claimed victory in the WRC2 category in one of the rainiest rallies in recent memory. The duo demonstrated both speed and the ability to avoid major setbacks during the grueling event.

And the conditions were truly challenging: rocky sections and deep “fesh-fesh” sand caused technical problems and breakdowns for nearly all competitors. Elsewhere, heavy rain turned the roads intomuddy quagmires stretching hundreds of meters in some places. Conditions were so bad that organizers deemed the “Camp Moran 2” and “Sleeping Warrior 2” special stages impassable for the WRC2 field.

Virves and his Fabia RS Rally2, however, excelled in these conditions. Although they fell slightly behind their rivals on Thursday and throughout Friday, Virves gradually found his rhythm and, unlike his competitors, managed to avoid any issues, allowing him to take the lead in the overall standings during Friday’s stage. And he didn’t let anyone else take the lead after Friday’s midday break; by Saturdayevening, the Toksport WRT crew had increased their lead to nearly one minute.

“It’s one of the worst situations because then you start looking for and listening to things you wouldn’t normally notice,” Robert Virves described the stress associated with being the leader. Virves kept his cool, however, and avoided problems on Sunday as well, so he maintained his position. “It’s an amazing feeling. At first, I didn’t really want to come here, but I think we experienced a real Safari. We owethe fact that we managed it without any problems to the incredible effort of the entire team,” said Robert Virves after his second career victory in the WRC2 category. In the overall standings, this evenresulted in fifth place, right behind the four WRC1 cars.

Other crews driving Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 cars also performed exceptionally well. Fabrizio Zaldivar and Marcelo Der Ohannesian of the RaceSeven team finished third in the WRC2 category. They, too, avoided major issues throughout the race and held off a challenge from Andreas Mikkelsen, who made his return to the Škoda brand in Kenya. “To be honest, competing against Andreas is quitechallenging. He’s a driver I looked up to when I was starting my career,” Zaldivar commented on the battle.

Mikkelsen thus finished fourth on his return to the Mladá Boleslav-based automaker, recording the most stage wins among the WRC2 crews. Of the eighteen stages the cars actually completed, he woneight. “After our delay on Thursday, there was really a lot to make up for. Even though the result wasn’t what we hoped for, there are plenty of positives,” Andreas Mikkelsen summed up his Kenyan outing. After Thursday’s opening stage, he was making up for a nearly two-minute deficit because he ran out of windshield washer fluid, leaving his windshield covered in mud.

The Škoda crews then took sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth places in the WRC2 category: these were the duo of Daniel Chwist and Kamil Heller (Poland), the home crews of Karan Patel/Tauseef Khan and Aakif Virani/Zahir Shah, and the Kenyan-British duo of Samman Singh Vohra and Drew Sturrock. Of the ten WRC2 cars that finished the rally, seven were Škoda crews—that is, all seven crews that lined up at the start of the competition on Thursday.