May 8, 2015 – Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah fought back from early delays to claim victory in the inaugural Iranian round of the FIA Middle East Rally Championship (MERC) in Shiraz.
The Qatari, driving a Ford Fiesta RRC, won eight of the 11 stages to record a slender winning margin of 27 seconds over Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari. Abu Dhabi’s Sheikh Khalid Al-Qassimi was third of the seven finishers from the nine who started the international section of the two-day gravel rally.
The win was Al-Attiyah’s 57th in the MERC and that puts him just three victories shy of Mohammed Ben Sulayem’s record 60 successes. Co-driver Matthieu Baumel claimed his sixth MERC win.
