Qatar Motor and Motorcycle Federation (QMMF) President Abdulrahman Al Mannai and QMMF Executive Director Amro Al Hamad with the podium winners of the Qatar International Baja. Qatar’s Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah and co-driver Mathieu Baumel won the car category in their Toyota GR DKR Hilux.
Lusail: Qatar’s Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah and co-driver Mathieu Baumel clinched victory in the car category in their Toyota GR DKR Hilux, while Polish KTM rider Konrad Dabrowski stayed clear of late trouble to defend his motorcycle title at the end of a punishing Qatar International Baja yesterday.
Al Attiyah controlled proceedings through the demanding last stage to take the day’s win by 10min 18sec from Chinese rival Guoyu Zhang and that was sufficient for the Qatari to finish 16min 21.6secs ahead of Overdrive Racing team-mates,Denis Krotov and Konstantin Zhiltsov, in their Toyota Hilux.Zhang and his Spanish co-driver Oriol Mena rounded off the podium places in their Baic ORC BJ40,
Al Attiyah said: “It was a good Baja. The first day I had a small margin and the second day I pushed a lot. I thank Jean-Marc (Fortin) from Overdrive Racing for bringing me a new car and thanks to Qatar Airways for flying this car over very swiftly so that I was able to compete here. I am very glad to win here again on my home race. I always want to compete in every international event in Qatar and it’s great to bounce back with a win after my big crash in Abu Dhabi.”
Runner-up Krotov added: “After 35km, I had to stop and change the tyres. After that we lost a little power and didn’t have a big speed. One turbo was not working. But the race was good and I enjoyed the stages.”
Competitors tackled 224.96km on the final day and the route was split into four sections of 33.73km, 28.51km, 43.23km and 113.20km by three non-competitive transfer zones.
Overdrive Racing’s Juan Cruz Yacopini and Daniel Oliveras moved up to fourth overall on the final stage in the third of four Toyotas.
The experienced Meshari Al Thefiri began the day second in T3 behind his usual co-driver Nasser Al Kuwari and the Kuwaiti delivered a solid stage performance to set the fastest time and sneak through to win the FIA T3 category for lightweight prototype machines on his first race with a new MCE-5 T3M and Oriol Vidal looking after the navigation.
Al Thefiri also finished fifth overall.
Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah drives the Toyota GR DKR Hilux on his way to win the 2023 Qatar International Baja, yesterday.
With Nasser Al Kuwari and French co-driver François Cazalet dropping precious minutes on the stage with the lack of brakes and puncturs, that opened the door for the Qatari’s brother Abdulaziz to snatch second place in the category in his QMMF Rally Team Can-Am. On his debut in this type of motor sport, the former winner of the Qatar International Rally also finished in an excellent sixth in the general classification. Nasser came home in seventh and third in T3.
The French crew of Jeremie Warnia and Loic Minaudier managed to overhaul Brazil’s Cristiano de Sousa Batistaand Portuguese co-driver Fausto Moto to secure a narrow victory in the FIA T4 category in their Polaris RXR 1000 R. They finished eighth overall and beat their Can-Am rivals by 2min 10sec on the final day to secure a winning margin of just 30.3 seconds.
Seventeen minutes of time penalties for missing route waypoints had pushed Pau Navarro down the T4 rankings after the third stage in his FN Speed Team Can-Am. He climbed back to third on the final day.
Saudi Arabia’s Khalid Al Feraihi and French co-driver Sébastien Delaunay boosted their FIA Middle East Baja Cup title aspirations with valuable points for finishing 11th overall in their Nissan Patrol behind the 10th-placed Ronan Chabot in his Overdrive Toyota.
Krzysztof Holowczyc (Mini JCR Rally Plus) and Ahmed Al Shegawi (Can-Am) retired on Friday after their mechanical issues.
Dabrowski retains motorcycle title
Konrad Dabrowski retained his motorcycle title in Qatar with a polished performance that saw his win every stage on his KTM. The Pole won yesterday’s last stage by 6min 49sec to record a winning margin over Great Britain’s Robert Wallace of 31min 04.8sec. He also claimed the honours of finishing as the first FIM Junior.
With Martin Chalmers dropped out of contention on the final morning, the battle for the final place on the podium swung in favour of the Dutch female racer Mirjam Pol. The KTM rider climbed from eighth to third to finish as the top Women. She edged out Andrew Houlihan for the last podium place by just 66.4 seconds, although the Australian had the consolation of winning the Veterans’ class and finishing a fine fourth.
Emirati Mohammed Al Ramani climbed to fifth at the expense of sixth-place Canadian Jonathan Finn. Mohammed Al Balooshi was the championship leader after the opening round in Saudi Arabia and the Emirati reached the finish in eighth.
Several riders were handed time back overnight by FIM officials for delays on Friday helping at the scene of other competitors’ accidents. Oran O’Kelly received a credit of 53 minutes and Alex McInnes and Simon Marcic were also handed time back. McInnes went on to finish 10th overall after setting the second quickest time behind Dabrowski on the final stage. Marcic came home in third place on the day and finished 14th.
Emirati Sultan Al Balooshi did not restart after his problems on Friday. Arnoud Dom was the unofficial winner of the quad category after Haitham Al Tuwaijri and Abdulaziz Al Ahli failed to finish. Mansoor Al Suwaidi finished second.
