The race, bearing the name of this year auto24 Rally Estonia, held in three days. On Friday, the participants drove a short special stage urban asphalt, and on Saturday and Sunday they expect speedy and smooth gravel roads — a classic of the Estonian Rally.
Have won the 2014 Estonian champion from St. Petersburg is perfectly familiar with local roads. Moreover, just in this race, he participated for the sixth time, while earlier he had won a victory here and twice finished on the podium.
Armed with this year's Modern Ford Fiesta R5 «Lucas,» as fans call him, intended to increase the score of victories, and at the same time to improve the situation in the individual competition of the championship.
Initially, the race was on his script. To begin with the crew of Alexey Alexey Arnautova Lukyanyuk and won the qualification and received the right to choose the starting position of the first — the Russians preferred to start the last of the seeded and selected participants 14th place.
The first phase, crews drove on Friday on the asphalt and cobblestones, brought victory to the Russians. And even on a short special stage length of 1.33 kilometers Aleksey Lukyanuk ahead of all his rivals for two seconds or more.
On Saturday from St. Petersburg did not shelve your quest for victory — won the two morning special stages duo two Alekseev nine seconds pulled away from closest rival, which became Egon Kaur. However, behind the Estonian company has a «sworn friends» claiming his position in the face of Ralph Sirmatsisa, Cayetano Kaetanovicha, Siim Plange and Rainer Aus.
Having won two of the following special stage in second place came Sirmatsis, and at the ninth SU Kaur was forced to lay down their arms because of the engine exploded.
On the track is dominated by two — and Lukyanyuk Sirmatsis. In the second section both won two dopa, giving the final special stage of the day — 1.66 kilometer spectator additional Elva — at the mercy of Raul Yeetsu and Rainer Ausu.
As a result, after the end of the Saturday of the Russian Rally Estonia was in the lead, ahead of Latvian for 20 seconds. Third went Kaetanovich, but its backlog was already fifteen minutes.
On the second day the crew had to pass six special stages. The leader of the race immediately began churning out victories — Alex Lukyanyuk won three special stages of the morning section, increasing its lead over Sirmatsisa to 28 seconds.
The final section of the Russians also started with a win, but at the next special stage — the penultimate SU Vissi — his Ford Fiesta R5 is not finished, having stood on the sidelines with a broken front left wheel.
What happened? The next landing after one of the dozens of kickers resulted in the failure of steering draft. The car suffered a sideways, he crashed into a tree and the front left suspension ordered to live long...
Last flight of Ford Fiesta R5 Russian crew looked like this:
or so — but here you have to run through the roller until the 4:04:
Beautiful flight «cost» Aleksey Lukyanuk not only victory, but also the possibility to drastically reduce its backlog in the individual competition at the European Rally Championship. The victory of the Russians, along with a third place Caetano series leader Kaetanovicha have narrowed the gap between Russian and Pole to a single point...
But after the withdrawal of «Lucas» victory celebrated Ralph Sirmatsis. Lett was the first since the beginning of the season racer to win two stages of the European Championship — before all the participants won only once each.
Kaetanovich finished second, ahead of Rainer Aus, Raul Yeetsa, Jaroslaw Koltun, Lukas Habaya, Miko-Ove Niinnemyaya, Russian Alexander Mikhailov, Marian Griebel and Chris Ingram.
Unlike the other stages of the European Championship in Estonia, Russia was represented by not one or two, and once six crew. However, to finish only got four of them.
The irony of fate addition descended from the broken Lukyanyuk race left and the other permanent member of the European Rally Championship Nikolai Gryazin. Its similarity to the SU13 was no less impressive than the end of the «Lucas» race:
It's a shame, because at the time of gathering Kohl took the second place in the standings ERC Junior and ninth in the overall standings. It so happens that the special stages before the same Peugeot 208 R2 flipped his brother Basil. But, fortunately, his «roof» has not led to a descent — Bob finished in 18th position.
Two positions below Rally Estonia finished Artur Muradyan — Muscovite won the RC3 standings — followed by finishing Alexander Kudryavtsev.
The next stage of the European Championship will be held from 4 to 6 August in Poland — there will take place the Rally Rajd Rzeszowski. Post fight Caetano Kaetanovichu on the home track will not be easy, but it is necessary — for opponents Pole each stage is now at a premium.
Hopefully, Alex Lukyanyuk find opportunities and be released at the start of the seventh and all subsequent stages of the European Rally Championship.
Photo: Mark Alexeev
