(MENAFN- EIN Presswire)
The Tatra Buggyra ZM Racing drivers are not giving up and are still fighting for the best daily position on the Dakar Rally.
AL DUWADIMI, SAUDI ARABIA, January 15, 2024 /EINPresswire / -- Buggyra ZM Racing pilot Aliyyah Koloc returned to action in the elite Ultimate class after a day off with a 30th place finish in today's stage. She is 31st overall due to technical problems early in the event. In today's seventh stage, Pascar de Baar set the fifth fastest time in the Tatra Buggyra EVO3. Unfortunately, both Tatra Phoenix, piloted by Jaroslav Valtr and Daniel Stiblík, have not escaped technical problems and are still on the track. All three crews are out of the overall standings, fighting for results in the stages of the Dakar Experience.
Pascal de Baar was delighted with the profile of today's battle with the Saudi Arabian terrain. "I like stages like this. Tough, hard, a few dunes. It was technical, not too demanding. You wait all year for such tracks. We had to be very careful with the tyres. We had a problem with navigation. We missed two waypoints, but I don't have to watch that so much now. We finished in the dark, but that was fine," said the Dutchman.
His on-board mechanic Tomáš Šikola described how difficult it was to change a tyre in the dunes. "So it wasn't a five-minute change, but we spent quite a lot of time there. In the sand you couldn't lift the car. We had to throw sand for twenty minutes and make a hole. It wasn't easy at all."
Aliyah Koloc didn't escape the punctures either, yet she could be satisfied with getting to the bivouac in daylight. "Stage seven was very long and rocky. But there was no shortage of dunes, it was varied. We had two punctures, one with fifteen kilometres to go. We had a problem with the jack, so it took much longer than usual to change the tyre. At one point we got a bit held up and we wandered for a long time at the start. We had a lot of trouble today, but we're glad we finished in daylight," said the only 19-year-old pilot.
Co-driver Sébastien Delaunay described how the crew coped with the failure of the jack. "The jack didn't work. We had to collect a lot of stones, make a stand out of them and put the car on it. Only when the wheel was in the air could we change it," explained the Frenchman.
Buggyra Racing Organisation
Buggyra Powersports OU
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