The KCB Kenya National Rally championships (KNRC) 2016 third leg goes to the lakeside city Kisumu County where Equator Motor Club (EMC) will host some of the fastest drivers the country has produced.
The KCB Kisumu Rally will see the current Africa Rally championship and KNRC champion Jaspreet Chatthe, take to the Cane farms in Kisumu to make a stub at defending his current title. Despite losing the first leg of this year’s National championships to Tapio Laukkanen, ‘Jassi’ as he is popular known is ready to face the Finn’s lightning speed.
Tapio who led from start to finish in leg one of the KNRC championships in Kajiado, is gearing to defend his Kisumu record registered last year. Kisumu will once again be a wet rally and the technical aspects of the rally cars must take that into consideration. Tapio is already in the country early enough to test his Subaru GVB13 R4 machine.
The rivalry between the top drivers will be in display in Kisumu as 2014 champion Baldev Charger is not yet through with his rallying. “I will be in Kisumu to try and catch up with the champions,” Baldev said without divulging much of his plans.
“KCB is pleased to continue its sponsorship of this national heritage, this year the bank gave Kshs.45 million as a mark of its commitment to the sport and growing the culture of local tourism. As a bank we also get the opportunity to engage with our customers in Nyanza and western regions as we celebrate great professional driving, said KCB Director Logistics Asiko Awiro.
The clerk of the cause Rohit Budhia has designed a great route for drivers that will see most of the rallying take place in private farms. This is a requirement under the Africa Rally Championships regulations. “The rules state that in order for an international Rally to be considered to have met stipulated standards 50% of the route should be in private secure roads”, said Rohit.
The rally will be flagged off at KCB Kisumu town branch and head on to the Nucleus spectator stage for competitive section 1.
KCB Kisumu rally will have three designated spectator stages located along the Nucleus, Kabonyo and in Chemelil along the Simba competitive sections. Nucleus spectator stage will cover 19.41 Kilometers and spectators are guaranteed to see rally cars twice, since Nucleus route will cater for competitive section 1 and 5.
“Despite the lack of sufficient private farms in Nyanza we have been offered some very good routes in Chemase inside sugarcane farms we thank Kibos farms for this gesture,” added Rohit.
Competitive section 2 and 4 will start at Kabonyo covering 47.34 Kilometers to finish at Mberere. There will be a short section of 8.64 kilometers at Simba in Chemelil and the rally will finish at Kibos Sugar Industry yard at Chemase.
Currently, Tapio is leading in the KNRC 2016 standing with 25 points after his epic win in the first rally in Kajiado. Closely following in 2nd position is KNRC and Safari Rally champion Ian Duncan with 21 points with Jaspreet Chatthe in third position with 18 points.
In group two Eric Bengi is leading with 25 points followed by Sammy Nyori with 21 points and in third place is Leonardo Varese with 18 points and fourth position is Gumit Thethy with 15 points.