BONUS - RUSTENBURG - The Toyota Gazoo Racing SA (TGRSA) Safari 1000, the third round of the SA Rally-Raid Championship that took place over three days on 21, 22 and 23 June from the Koedoeskop Laerskool in the Thabazimbi area in Limpopo, got off to a solid start.
Henk Lategan/Brett Cummings (TGRSA Hilux IMT EVO) were the first team to take on the 14 kilometre Castrol Qualifying Race during the morning and posted the fastest time.
As expected, not much separated the teams and Jayden Els/Henry Köhne (King Price Xtreme SVR) finished only two seconds behind in second place, followed 17 seconds later by two teams with the exact same time – Brian Baragwanath/Leonard Cremer (Century Racing CR7 Twin Turbo) and Saood Variawa/Francois Cazalet (TGRSA Hilux IMT EVO) with their TGRSA team-mates, Guy Botterill/Dennis Murphy finishing fifth, three seconds further adrift.
The top 10 teams then drew for their starting positions with Lategan/Cummings taking the gamble by choosing to start stage one from 10th place with Botterill/Murphy having to open the road followed by Variawa/Cazalet and Els/Köhne.
Baragwanath/Cremer were off in fourth place followed by Chris Visser/Albertus Venter (Red-Lined REVO T1+ GTR) in fifth place. Despite being 10th on the road, the gamble for Lategan/Cummings paid off with the team posting the fastest time again. Their total time (01:17:30) was a minute and 58 seconds faster than their team-mates, De Villiers/Vonk who wrong-slotted and were caught behind teams who suffered punctures and mechanical issues.
Behind De Villiers/Vonk, the reigning champions and 2023 desert race winners, Gareth Woolridge/Boyd Dreyer (Neil Woolridge Motorsport Ford NWM Ranger T1+) stormed home to post the third fastest combined time, trailing the current SARRC leaders by a mere 30 seconds after starting stage one from 27th position, due to time lost with a puncture in the qualifier.
The second Ford NWM Ranger T1+ in the hands of Lance Woolridge/Kenny Gilbert finished fourth, 44 seconds behind their team-mates with the top five rounded out by Botterill/Murphy who, like Woolridge/Gilbert, had to manage a flat tyre towards the end of the stage.
Also in the top 10 were the brothers, Fouché and Bertus Blignaut (#TeamHilux Rally-Raid Toyota Hilux IMT EVO) in a total time of 01:21:33, nine seconds ahead of Baragwanath/Cremer in seventh place; Wors Prinsloo/André Vermeulen (Neil Woolridge Motorsport Ford NWM Ranger T1+), 30 seconds further adrift in eighth and only 14 seconds ahead of Eben Basson/Leander Pienaar (#TeamHilux Rally-Raid), who ended the day as the leaders in the Adventurer T1 Class in their quest for a first race finish this season. Basson/Pienaar were 56 seconds ahead of their class rivals, Johan de Bruyn/Adriaan Roets (Red-Lined REVO T1) who were 10th overall.
Only two SSV teams entered the TGRSA Safari 1000 with Geoff Minnitt/Rodney Burke (Hydro Power Equipment Can-Am Maverick) the early leaders in 18th place overall while former champions, Ian Mostert with his father, Werner, reading the notes in the Moto-Netix Racing Can-Am Maverick, were 29th.
