MUNDIAL - TODO O TERRENO - MOROCCO DESERT CHALLENGE
Quinta, 18 Abril 2019 18:53 | Actualizado em Sábado, 20 Abril 2024 05:31
All classifications are provisionary until penalty modifications are made and definitive results are published on www.moroccodesertchallenge.com
The 2nd special of this 11th edition of the Morocco Desert Challenge was a playground for pilots. 401 kilometers of rolling tracks across the Moroccan Sahara allowed the fastest to test their engine to the fullest. A pleasure for trucks that have been able to overtake freely on large parts of road perfectly adapted to their size. A day that was particularly successful for Erik VAN LOON and Wouter ROSEGAAR (# 304 - Toyota) who scratched in 3:55:51.
This stage was made to let the best performing vehicles stand out. The course was designed in the middle of large empty plains, without stones or technical difficulties, a vast field to let the pilots talk and have fun in their driving. They could enjoy a desert landscape with wide flat plains in the middle of a few valleys without vegetation or almost. These are mainly very fast sandy tracks that took the competitors to the bivouac of Smara, with some gravel passages to find a little fesh-fesh not posing any real difficulty. Only the dust on the smaller vehicles was the most disruptive element of this 2nd day, as it was easy to surpass competitors. The navigation was not complicated but it was still necessary to remain suspicious to avoid possible errors and other dangers mentioned on the roadbook, perfectly realized by the director of race Jean-Claude KAKET.
Moto #106 Skyler Howes (USA) (at the finish line)
It’s been a little difficult in the morning, because of the fog, we had very low visibility. Because of that I made a couple of mistakes, the navigation was not difficult, but the lack of visibility made things difficult. I ended up losing 6 minutes at the refueling to Joan. After the gas check, it was very fun for me: very, very fast tracks, a lot more sandy, less rocky, things were a lot more fun, I was able to catch back Joan and ended up passing him, to lead again the last six or seven kilometers from the finish; it was fun and challenging, because Joan is very fast and if I made any navigation errors he would pass me again, he forced me to stay on top of my game. Overall, I’m happy to continue being at the front, no crashes, and no crashes yesterday, I continue having fun and learning a lot in this, my first experience in Africa!
Moto #104 Joan Pedrero (Spain) (at the finish line)
We had a really tricky stage today. I started in second place, after I took a radar penalty yesterday. The first part of the stage, until the refueling, was very challenging, because of the fog, which forced us to be very cautious; despite that, I managed to catch and pass Skyler, achieving a good margin of around 5 minutes. However, the second part was very fast and after the fog disappeared my rival caught me back and passed me a few kilometers from the finish. We got there very close, which I think should be enough for me to win the stage and possibly get ahead in the overall classification. But tomorrow it will be my turn to open the race and the play will continue. I’m happy with the bike, happy with my feeling, happy with the tracks and the roadbook, so everything is in place to continue giving the maximum!
Car #303 Paolo Ferreira
It was a very nice stage, very fast where we could drive up to 185km / h. We had 2 flat tires unfortunately which made us waste time. We also have a little mechanical problem to identify but we are not worried, we cannot wait to start again tomorrow.
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