Russian team driver “KAMAZ-master” Dmitry Sotnikov satisfied with the performance of the third stage of the Silk Way rally-raid in the truck classification.
Sotnikov’s crew completed the distance in 3 hours 29 minutes 52 seconds, ahead of KAMAZ-master crews Andrei Karginov (offset of 5 minutes 51 seconds) and Edward Nikolaev (+7.59).
– I will not divulge the details of yesterday’s failure, he will remain in the team. I will only say that this is a spec, as we test different parts.
Today, we are satisfied with everything, nothing bothered us. We tried to work clearly, competently. There was a lot of dust. I understand that everyone was driving quite well. I saw Edik Nikolaev – he was standing behind the wheel, then Sergey Vyazovich was standing, and Andrey Karginov was already on the horizon. Apparently it had problems, there were traces, as if it was going out. And at the end they were driving slowly, and we kinda bumped into their dust.
In general, they coped with the task, there were no losses. The technology works very well today. There are more and more new tracks on the track, on which there are no tracks, no turnarounds and in the end they promised fast, fast, but the end of Big Brother was so deadly, just about patience – you can’t go around , constantly hard bumps. I don’t think it will be easier in Grozny,” Sotnikov told reporters.
The Russian driver Vladimir Vasiliev also shared his emotions from the stage, which won the third stage of the off-road category with a result of 3 hours 36 minutes 51 seconds.
– I didn’t see any big sands, but there was a Big Brother dune. We stopped: on the road, we hit a step that the car got up and blocked. It turned out, automatically stood on the handbrake. This is the first time in my life that this should happen, even though it shouldn’t happen. I thought the wheels had come off, but I pulled the handbrake and we were off. The day was tough, the special was faster than yesterday.
The navigation is correct. There were places that were hard to see. We went first, the path was overgrown, it was not visible. As a result, I lost speed, driving like off-road,” Vasiliev said.
The length of the distance of the third stage in Astrakhan was 387.02 km, the high-speed section – 322.98 km.
The “Silk Way” rally-raid will end in Moscow on July 16.
Source : MatchTV
