Kenya: Blomqvist for Safari Classic

Nairobi Star (Nairobi)

Samson Ateka

22 April 2011

Former world champion will be driving a Ford Escort Mark 2 in the Safari Rally Organisers of the Kenya Airways Safari Classic Rally have received a surprise entry from 1984 World Rally Champion Stig Blomqvist of Sweden to be navigated by Venezuelan Ana Goni.

Driving a Ford Escort Mark 2, supplied and serviced by Viking Motorsport, the duo will definitely be top contenders for overall victory amongst the six other top contenders.

Viking Motorsport are based in the UK and are run by former top WRC co-driver Phil Mills (of Petter Solberg fame). They build Ford Escort Mark 2 rally cars and have two entered in the Safari Classic for John Lloyd and now Stig Blomqvist.

Long rains in Kenya have being playing havoc with the route and many parts are too wet and muddy at the moment to finalise the route survey. This will definitely make the route in 2011 one of the toughest ever.

Though the route plans are complete, they remain a secret until the start of the rally. This prohibits drivers from having an advantage over their rivals in a sport where speed, stamina and reliability of the machines dictates the outcome of the competition.

The format for the nine-day event differs slightly from that of the Kenya National Rally Championship series in terms of how the route notes are made and how drivers prepare. Emphasis is placed on the use of special equipment to measure metres as navigators are forced to move away from the “pace-notes” way of guiding drivers through the stages.

Classic Rally organisers prefer to use “danger notes” where distances between obstacles such as corners, rivers, mud holes or junctions are in kilometres while “pace-notes”, as the name suggests, these are separated in metres. The Safari organisers have released an outline of the rally with the location of the night halts.

From his base in Germany, former Safari Rally technician Karl-Heinz Goldstein will be on hand to advise European drivers on how to prepare for the Kenya Airways event that has some of the most rugged roads in the world.

The German is a highly respected engineer having worked for some of the best “works’ teams to have taken part in the Safari Rally when it was regarded as the toughest in the world motor sports calendar. He was the chief engineer and designer for the Opel Ascona and Manta 400’s, Toyota Celica rally cars and VW Golfs before retiring and is still involved as an advisor to rally teams in Europe.

Goldstein has visited all the Classic Safari Rally editions in different capacities since it was first run in 2003. This year he will once again be part of the senior management team as the chief scrutineer to ensure the cars comply with their papers. Access Kenya will be providing internet connectivity all around the rally route.

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