Friday 3 April 2009

Safari Rally : Low Key Start


Logo courtesy of Motorsport Kenya.

For an event which attracted thousands of fans, the sport is slowly drifting into international rallying obscurity. The event was flagged off and the rest of the city was almost unmoved.
What's even worse the cars will cover only about 700 kms ( approx 437 miles) and mainly feature runs in 'people's farms as a local driver put it in the Press today.The rally had also almost sunk due to the low interest by sponsors though the buzz came on thanks to KCB who are the title sponsors. The weather has also played its worst and a dusty rally with patches of rains dotting parts of the route.
The magic of the Safari Rally just seems gone. Even some of us were not so impressed by the spectator stage which has been a highlight for the last 4 years. Organisers had better come up with a better thing ( like 2 cars racing on the track) to make it more exciting.
They can also add a skills section just to showcase what some of the drivers can do (I remember Richard Burns doing some spins on the Argentine finishing ramp and it was worth watching)...
We also need to fully provide for the rally and let by-gones be by-gones, WRC has forgotten about us and the faster we forget them the better. We might as well have a section for our crazy matatu drivers and weekend speed-racing wannabes from well-to-do neighbourhoods. That makes more sense to us !

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