Balkan Offroad Rally 2022, Leg 2: last trip around Sighisoara.
The second racing day of Balkan Offroad Rally 2022 was really dynamic for all the competitors. The route was once again in the mountains around the beautiful city of Sighisoara, and the nature said its highest word – the conditions were different during all parts of the day: starting with rain and fog in the morning and moving to clear sun in the afternoon. Again, all the racers faced multiple kind of terrains: forests, valleys, rivers and slippery country roads.
In the cross-country category, the day offered more than 250 kilometers against the clock, divided in two special stages. Speed, but more important – attention to the navigation, were the main things that everybody should respect on the track. Once again, for the extreme class there had “only” 50 kilometers for the stage. But it was not definitely an easy walk in the park – a lot of mud and big hills and slopes were in the menu, so the day was more than though.
In the bike class, the situation in the top 3 was opposite to that from the previous day, but still KTM was the winning machine. So, Rob Van Vegchel from Nederlands was the fastest, followed by the South African Matthew Grid and Krzysztof Jarmul from Poland.
As for the quads, the stage win was claimed by Marcin Wilkolek from Poland, who finished in front of his fellow countryman and teammate from Polaris Polska team Rafal Jawien. Third for the day was the Latvian pilot of CFMOTO Adomas Gancierius.
In the SSV class, the day was very good for another Polish competitor – Maciej Stolarski, who set the best time, overtaking Tomas Zaleckas from Lithuania with 3 and a half minutes. Top 3 was completed by the Dutch driver Andre Thewessen and once again three Can Am buggies was on the daily podium.
Continuing with the cars from the Cross-Country class, it was the Bulgarian pilot Doncho Tsanev with his rear wheel-driven prototype, who did the long stage fastest. The two-time “silver medalist” from the previous editions of Balkan Offroad Rally, finished with 7:27 minutes advantage to Rients Hofstra (Nissan Proto). But the driver from Nederland had a bigger advance from the first leg and (unofficially) is leading the convoy. Third for the day was the winner from the very first edition in 2011 Joerg Gruenbeck from Germany with his Mercedes G.
In the Extreme race, once again it was a battle between the Estonian pilots Hardo Mere and Joel Purga. And once again Mere was the winner, finishing the hard stage with half an hour advantage. Third was Franck Daurelle, who had 10 minutes more for the day than Purga.
Leg 3 of Balkan Offroad Rally 2022 seeing the caravan moving to the second camp in Alba Iulia. There will be more than 340 kilometers in the menu and both categories – Cross-Country and Extreme will share the same route.
Fotografie: Actiongraphers, Paolo Baraldi & Mika Pietrus. Tekst: RBI.
