Italian Baja. Stand by...
Friday, 20 March 2009 02:27
The last preparations to the second round of the FIA International Cup for Bajas are going in Italy. After the administrative checks and the scrutineering on Friday morning competitors will put their vehicles into the Parc Ferme by 2 pm local time (16:00 Moscow time). At 3 pm the first Stewards Meeting will be held which will determine the quantity and the order of crews allowed to start. Overall in the entry list there're 76 participants (38 cars in the international classification, 6 in the national one, 9 bikers and 23 (!!!) on quads).
Interesting that 20 (more than a half) out of competitiors in the International classification are not from Italy which means a big interest paid to this race by foreigners. The official start ceremony will be held at 15:30 in Piazza del Popolo situated in San Vito al Tagliamento. And the SuperSpecial stage, so admired by local drivers and spectators, will start for cars at 16:55 CET (18:55 Moscow time). And although we'll can tell you provisional results, the partial classification of the Leg will be available only later in the evening at 23:00 local time.
On Saturday and Sunday there're two full days of fighting: the crews will have to tackle an 82.8 kilometres long stage 5 times (3 and 2 respectively). Overall there're 424 competitive kilometres to be covered (together with the SSS).
Day one. Giovedi (Thursday).
Sunny weather, bright sky and warm spring air - that's how Italy met the crew of Boris Gadasin and Vladimir Demyanenko and their team today. Black angry clouds, dank rain and cold wind - that's how the race's eve finished. However, despite the freaking weather, the leaders of the International Cup managed to yield an efficient day.
Having started early in the morning, the crew was busy with testing of the car until the late evening. First of all, the new propshaft, which was prepared for the team by its new european partners, was tested. More strong and reliable, it should live up to Boris' expectations for the race and let him push to the limit. The suspension settings were also changed during the session, and that made the car's handling and overall balance better. According to the driver's own words, all these changes combined with brakes adjustments, made the new car's behaviour almost perfect. "Moreover, after "Northern Forest" we tuned our engine on a special motor testing stand, and it turned out that its performance was even higher than according to the declared data. For example the maximum torque was 64 kg/m instead of 62, and it's pleasant to know such capabilities of our engine", - added the leader of G-Force Motorsport.
And the fight is going to be really tough and interesting even despite initial complaints about the lack of strong works entries in the race: having arrived to the venue, our team found out that one of Boris' and Vladimir's most dangerous rivals - dutchman Tonnie van Deijne - would compete behind the wheel of a Mitsubishi Pajero MPR13 car which he recently bought from the "Diamonds" team after they had withdrawn from the sport. One of the best raid cars in hands of a very experienced driver - that could bring some new intrigue into the Baja's plot.
Our crew will pass the administrative checks and the scrutineering soon after midday tomorrow. Later in afternoon the grand opening will be held, followed by the race's prologue. Its route uses the dried bed of a river, but we could see in the evening there was pretty much water, so probably we can expect some more surprises tomorrow...
team manager Igor Chervonny, directly from Italy...
PR director Alexander Lesnikov, with comments from Moscow
Photos by team director Svetlana Shakhova