The Peninsula
Qatari rally ace Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah is looking forward to winning the Rally Mexico “Sonora”which constitutes the third round of the new World Rally Raid Championship, which was introduced by the International Automobile Federation last year.
Al Attiyah, world champion in long-distance desert rallies (cross-country) and five-time champion of the Dakar Rally, accompanied by his French navigator Mathieu Baumel, finished his strong preparations for the Sonora Rally, which will start with an opening stage in the city of Hermosillo tomorrow.
The Qatari champion, the holder of the title of the first edition of the World Championship, faces strong competition this season from Frenchman Sebastien Loeb, who won the World Rally Championship nine times previously, who seeks to record his seventh victory in Mexico and maintain the lead in the World Cup for Desert Rally Championships this year. Al Attiyah, the champion that he is, sounded confident ahead of the rally. "We have speed. We are strong. I am sure it will be a big fight in Mexico and in the next rounds,” said the Qatari ace.
Accompanied by his navigator Fabien Lorquin, Loeb is 16 points ahead of his arch-rival Al Attiyah, who is in second place, and who seeks to take advantage of the Mexico Rally to pounce on the lead. Loeb had won nine of the 19 stages so far in the first two rounds of the World Cup for Desert Rally Championship, which are the Dakar Rally and the Abu Dhabi Desert Rally.
Loeb is relishing his return to action in Mexico, where he previously won six times on his way to nine World Rally Championship titles.
“Of course, I have very good memories from Rally Mexico in the WRC as I always enjoyed that rally, so hopefully it wll be the same with this WRRC round, too,” said the Frenchman.
“It’s always a new adventure whenever there’s a new event for anyone, and Sonora certainly has that feel to it. We’re leading the championship, so the goal will be to finish the rally still in front in the standings — that’s the target. It’s been quite a few weeks that Fabian and I have been out of the car, so we’ll be happy to get back behind the steering wheel and have some fun on the stages.”
Also competing in the Mexican Rally are Prodrive Hunter cars, also from the Brazilian X-Rally Team, driven by Christian Baumgart and his co-driver Alberto Andreotti, and Marcus Baumgart and his navigator Clipper Sencia.
The new addition to the FIA cross-country calendar is also the first event of its kind to be staged in México that is sanctioned by the sport’s governing body. Formerly a round of just the FIM series, the event has been revised to adhere to FIA regulations and is the brand child of American racer Darren Skilton and his team.
Action will be fought out over five legs and a provisional 1,249 competitive kilometres in a route of 2,091km between the bustling city of Hermasillo, the fishing and resort city of Puerto Peñasco (Rocky Point) on the Gulf of California and the Arizona-México border town of San Luis Rio Colorado in northern México.
The demanding off-road event will pass through the state of Sonora en route towards the Sea of Cortez and across the cactus deserts of historical Caborca before reaching the famous dunes of the Altar Desert and on to the ceremonial finish in San Luis Rio Colorado’s El Bosque park.