Tapio, Bengi and Kirimi prosper as KCB Eldoret Rally winds up
After retiring in Voi last month, Eric Bengi regained the Championship lead after winning the Two-Wheel Drive Class in the KCB Eldoret Rally over the weekend.
Farhaaz Khan wonn the Kenya National Rally Championship Division 1 class in 13th while Jansher Sandhu won Division Three in 11th overall position with Dennis Mwenda winning Division 2 for the second event running.
Navigated by Tony Gikuhi in a Toyota RunX, Bengi finished the Western Kenya Motor Cub (WKMC) round in 19th overall position.
Second overall in 2WD was Sammy Nyorri also in a Run X while Gurmit Thethy came third.
“After retiring in Voi, we have assessed our risks and evaluated the capability of the car. It was really important for us to score some points in this rally after the mishap in Voi and I’m happy we have our lead back,” said Nyorri.
“CS1 our Proflex shocks did 15km only. After that we drove without rear shocks. The problem was fixed in service so we were limping through prior to the second loop. Gurmit Thethy romped home third in 2WD to make up for his no-show in Voi.
“We had a good run in Eldoret, although we lost time in the first stage when we caught the car ahead of us and were sitting in its dust for about 15kms. With poor visibility I hit a couple of stones and damaged the exhaust. On the last loop in the Flouspar section we had to do the last 4kms with jamming brakes which slowed us down further. All in All, it was a great event and we are happy to have finished 3rd and also breaking the Eldoret Jinx in style!” Gurmit said.
Finnish driver Tapio Laukkanen took a convincing outright victory in Eldoret after leading from start to finish in a Subaru Impreza GVB13. The Former British and Finland Rally champion beat Kenyan youngster Rajbir Rai by a 2minutes 55seconds margin to make up for months of gremlins while former Ugandan champion Jas Mangat sealed the podium dash 3:52 minutes behind the winner. Tapio who is tackling the full season of the 2015 Kenya National Rally Championship won the opening Kisumu Rally in February but has had to contend with gremlins thereon.
“I mean the whole day we had some issues with our engine which was not running with full power. So at the begining I was a bit worried-but getting to the finish with a good result after some scares is always a good feeling. The roads are slightly rougher than what we have in Europe and Group Ns are not good on this types of roads,” said Tapio who was navigated by Pasi Torma in his R4 Subaru.
Tapio opened a 14 second cushion after the first run of the 40km Kispsaos-Kimwarer stage but the lead over Rajbir was reduced to a mere 2 second when Tapio punctured on Flourspar stage.
“We drove only 2kms after we picked up a front left puncture on the initial run of Flourspar luckily we didn’t lose so much time,” added Tapio.
Courtesy of the-star.co.ke