Yazeed Al-Rajhi stretched his overall lead over Miroslav Zapletal to 17 minutes after dominating Friday’s 192km selective section of Rally Jeddah from Khulais to Asfan.
With a day to go, the Saudi has one hand firmly on the Saudi Toyota Rally Championship title. His Overdrive Racing Toyota Hilux ran faultlessly, and the Riyadh driver and co-driver Dirk von Zitzewitz won the stage in just under two hours.
We finished the second day again in first place and we lead the overall standings and the championship. It was a fast stage, flat out but it had more rocks. Tomorrow the stage is shorter and we are looking forward to it.
Yazeed Al-Rajhi
Zapletal and Slovak navigator Marek Sykora remain a strong second in their Ford F-150 Evo. The Black Horse team’s Saleh Al-Saif and co-driver Egor Okhotnikov were comfortably third fastest on the day and hold third overall and the T3 lead in their Can-Am Maverick.
Saudi Border Guard team driver Khaled Al-Feraihi and French co-driver Sébastien Delaunay passed Dania Akeel and Uruguayan navigator Sergio Lafuente for fourth, although Akeel remains second in T3 behind Al-Saif.
Maha Al-Hameli and Sweden’s Annie Seel moved ahead of Saeed Al-Mouri and Jordanian navigator Ata Al-Hmoud in T4 after Al-Mouri received 15 minutes of penalties for missing a route waypoint.
Al-Ali takes motorcycle lead
Husqvarna rider Hamdan Al-Ali stormed to the motorcycle stage win, the Emirati unofficially stopping the clock in 2hr 45min 24sec to take the lead from Saudi Arabia’s Mishael Al-Ghuneim and Anass Al-Reheyani.
Al-Reheyani and Al-Ghuneim had been given four minutes of penalties before Friday’s restart for missing a route waypoint, dropping them from third and sixth to 10th and 11th before they fought back into contention.
Overnight leader Martin Chalmers hit technical problems and failed to finish the stage, while Ehab Al-Hakeem moved into contention for a podium place.
Haitham Al-Tuwaijri continued to lead his great quad rival Abdulmajeed Al-Khulaifi, helped when Al-Khulaifi was handed an hour of penalties for receiving outside assistance. Fellow Yamaha riders Abdulaziz Al-Atwai and Hani Al-Noumesi had their own problems and were a distant third and fourth.
The final round of the Saudi Toyota Rally Championship is organised by the Saudi Automobile and Motorcycle Federation (SAMF) with the Ministry of Sport and in partnership with Abdul Latif Jameel (ALJ) Motors.
Saturday
The rally ends with the second 131km selective section, starting and finishing in the historic agricultural governorate of Khulais in the Mecca Province, made up of SS2A (109km) and SS2B (22km).