July 26, 2015 – The next mission in the Qatar Rally Team’s logbook sees our crew heading to the Baja Aragón for this latest round of the FIA Cross-Country Rallies World Championship. With series leader Vladimir Vasilyev absent from the race a win in Spain will be enough for Nasser Al-Attiyah and co-driver Mathieu Baumel to take an outright lead in the championship.
The Qatar Rally Team arrive at the 32nd Baja Aragón in great form with an outstanding sequence of wins stretching from their Italian Baja victory last month to triumph at the Dakar Rally at the beginning of the year. Parking their flying Red Bull Mini on the top step of the podium in Spain would score Nasser and Mathieu 30 championship points, enough to overhaul Vasilyev who they currently trail by 21 points.
This weekend’s business kicks off with a 8km prologue stage on Friday followed by a total of 650km timed racing split between Saturday and Sunday. Extreme temperatures and dusty conditions mean the championship chasing duo must get their race management spot on if they are to add to this year’s impressive catalogue of wins.
It’s not just the challenging terrain in the Teruel Province that will test the Qatar Rally Team to the limit, plenty of other crews among the 77 cars entered into the race harbour their own designs on victory. Two-time Dakar winner and reigning Baja Aragón champion Nani Roma is once again intent on success at what he considers to be his home race.
At last year’s contest Roma crossed the line with a cushion of nearly 40 minutes over Nasser and Mathieu who suffered a number of mechanical issues on route to their 8th place finish. This time out Nasser and Roma are both at the wheel of a Mini so we can look forward to a true test of offroad racing skill combined with navigational know-how from the co-drivers.