Excellent news straight from Kenya: Kajetan Kajetanowicz and Maciej Szczepaniak started Safari Rally Kenya in great style, taking the lead in both WRC2 Challenger and WRC2 standings – ahead of all factory crews!
The competition in Safari Rally Kenya has started, as usual, with a superspecial stage Kasarani – side-by-side battle on almost 5 kilometres long test. Kajetanowicz and Szczepaniak set third-fastest time, crossing the finish line just 1.2 seconds behind the leaders. The ORLEN Rally Team duo picked up their pace significantly on the following test, Mzabibu 1 (8.27 kms). The Poles won this stage with whooping four seconds in hand over second-fastest crew, Solberg/Edmondson – claiming the lead! At the same time they hold an excellent ninth position in the overall standings, with only top-tier Rally1 cars ahead.
– We have completed two opening, warm-up stages of this year’s Safari Rally. We had a good feeling, I enjoyed my driving. Although it is still not easy to feel how much I can push in my new car, today’s results look promising. An enormous day awaits us tomorrow, with demanding stages – including one long test which is completely new and it could make life really tough for all crews. However, I hope we will manage to avoid possible difficulties.
– It is not possible to find words to describe the challenge of Friday morning’s stage Camp Moran. For sure I will have to stay more on the safe side, driving a bit slower than I can – I often keep this approach, trying to reduce the risk.
– We are leading the WRC2 Challenger standings and also the WRC2 classification. However, we focus on our category and we still need to work. We have a lot to do with our video recordings and we need to sleep well, as we are facing a very difficult day tomorrow
– Kajetan Kajetanowicz, the WRC2 Challenger champion, commented after day one.
It will be an early morning on Friday – starting at 6:00 local time (4:00 CET) with a short 15-minutes service zone. Afterwards the crews will tackle two runs of Camp Moran (31.40 kms), Loldia (19.11 kms), Kengen Geothermal (13.18 kms) and Kedong (15.10 kms) stages.
Starts of Kajetan Kajetanowicz are supported by the title partner of the ORLEN Rally Team – ORLEN S.A., as well as technical partner Delphi and ORLEN OIL.
Safari Rally Kenya, unofficial WRC2 classification after SS2:
- Kajetanowicz/Szczepaniak (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) 10:15.0
- Solberg/Edmondson (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) +1.3
- Solans/Sanjuan (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) +9.4
=. Domínguez/Peñate (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) +9.4 - Greensmith/Andersson (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) +10.4
- Zaldivar/Der Ohannesian (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) +12.3
- Patel/Khan (Škoda Fabia R5) +46.3
- Chwist/Heller (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) +51.6
- Wahome/Okundi (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) +55.3
- Tundo/Jessop (Ford Fiesta R5) +1:01.3
