My WRC Safari Rally 2023

[J4MIE]

Early check-in penalty?

Shhhhhhhhhhh!

[PLuto]

Shhhhhhhhhhh!

My personal tip - time for liaison in timecard was corrected manually (bulletin 2) and you read it 04 instead of 09?

[J4MIE]

My personal tip - time for liaison in timecard was corrected manually (bulletin 2) and you read it 04 instead of 09?

No it was a genuine mistake I made, I have had very little sleep and a little dehydrated and not been feeling great in general.
That section passed some bad traffic and we were told no lateness penalties would apply, there was a group of 4-5 cars in a convoy, eventually got to service and assumed everyone was late as well, so went straight in to the control.

Unfortunately I had misread the time card and was using completely wrong minute. Completely my mistake, bad call. But doesn’t affect position or anything.

[meh]

Thank you Jamie for sharing your adventure!

[macebig]

It's always interesting to read unfiltered views from people inside the rally. Thank you very much for taking the time to share your experiences with us, J4mie. See you in 2024?

[Steve Boyd]

No it was a genuine mistake I made, I have had very little sleep and a little dehydrated and not been feeling great in general.
That section passed some bad traffic and we were told no Kate was pebskties would apply, there was a group of 4-5 cars in a convoy, eventually got to service and assumed everyone was late as well, so went straight in to the control.

Unfortunately I had misread the time card and was using completely wrong minute. Completely my mistake, bad call. But doesn’t affect position or anything.

Been there, done that.

There are only two sorts of co-drivers - those who have booked in on the wrong minute and those who will book in on the wrong minute one day!

[J4MIE]

Been there, done that.

There are only two sorts of co-drivers - those who have booked in on the wrong minute and those who will book in on the wrong minute one day!

Yep, it’s annoying when it’s such an easy thing to check. There was another section which they had reduced by 5 mins and written the new time on the time card - for every other change they clearly scored out the original time, but not on this one. So we turned up 5 mins late. Its difficult enough reading the notes in big writing on the bumpy roads, never mind the writing on the time cards.

I’m not forgetting about the final day but I’m away on “actual” safari for a few days, so will update when I can.

[satnav]

Thanks for sharing your adventure with us all, a final though " the person who never made a mistake made nothing"

Cheers

[J4MIE]

So. Sunday dawned early (I’m not a morning person!) and the service crew did a good job of repairing the car and got it into parc ferme at 7:02. After about 30 mins sleep we raced the recce car back to service and jumped out right on our start time of 7:27. Unfortunately it took Minesh just over the minute to drive the car to the control, so we’re 1 min late out (10s penalty).

With everything that had gone on we hadn’t had a chance to go over the notes or tidy them up, but as we were last overall by a fairly long way, it was just a case of another steady day and aiming to get to the finish. Malewa was very rocky in places (especially first 2km) and opens up and becomes technical towards the end with straights and 90 degree bends. Very very steady run through (too steady really) and then onto Oserian. It was cancelled last year but this year went smoothly, but still deep sandy parts. We were lucky to avoid a troop of baboons which moved off the road just in time. It varied between deep ruts and smoother grassy sections but a relatively clean drive through. Onto Hell’s gate and I’m not too sure what happened in there as the notes were suddenly wrong after J3 and didn’t make sense, was very surprising as they seemed fine on the recce and were the best notes for a stage we did the previous year, so will have to look over the coverage to work out what happened. Picked them up at the next junction and was ok from there. Got to the end in front of the packed spectator area.
Onto the road section afterwards and it was a mess, this was caused by spectators arriving for the power stage.
Now for you lot that haven’t been to Kenya before, when traffic in your lane forms a queue, you go past, and keep going until that lane stops, then use the hard shoulder on the opposite side of the road, and so on, until of course that stops and traffic doing the same from the other direction, so nothing can move. Then a few cars shuffle around to get past each other and it takes hours to clear.
There was a few police there who seemed to be helping (unusually) and we managed to get a group of 5-6 rally cars to form a small convoy, which makes it much easier to move through jams - we were well up the verge on the left and most other cars were able to leave just enough space for us to get through. As this was happening an official shouted through the window that the organisers were aware and lateness penalties wouldn’t apply. This is where the above mistake happened and I read the minutes of our due time from the previous TC and as this was about a minute away, I assumed that is and the rest of the cars in the convoy were all late. We dropped back from the car ahead due to the dust on the road into service, then skipped the car wash (as nobody else was using it) then into the TC thinking we were due at 11:13, but we weren’t late at all and were due at 11:25 - we went in at 11:20 so were 5 minutes early - the other cars ahead had gone into the media zone whereas I thought they were already into service. In my sleep deprived state it was an easy mistake to make, but still no excuse for it at WRC level. Luckily it didn’t affect our position at all. This mistake was realised when we jumped ahead in the queue at service out.
Off we went for the final loop and again just wanted to keep it steady. Were a bit quicker through Malewa and were going ok in Oserian 2 until we went round an off camber sandy left hander to find that Nikhil running ahead of us was stuck fast in the deep fesh fesh. There was nothing we could do but to hit the bank and stop behind him (the sand dragging us downhill into the bank). We backed up and tried again but ended up in the same position. Then we were able to back up a bit more and slowly climb the bank on the left and squeeze past. For those that don’t know, Nikhil is paralysed from the waist down and his Evo X has hand controls, so is a lot more awkward to get moving after being stuck. We finished the stage having lost a good 2 minutes or so, and were very glad to see Nikhil managed to reach the regroup without being too late, however had lost nearly an hour in the stage.
The power stage wasn’t as rutted as last year, but still pretty bad. Same issue with notes but got to the end and very happy to finish. The road section was completely ridiculous this time and we first were going along the verge on the wrong side of the road before finding it completely jammed. After Minesh going for a wander and discussing with the vehicles around us, they were able to shuffle around a bit and make enough space for us to get around and head up the verge on the left, still slower than before but were sure that delays would be allowed for and I was making damn sure of calculating the correct time!!
Got to the service area and straight into parc ferme.
We watched the podium celebrations of the top three then wrc2, wrc3, then a few others, then suddenly they said that was it for the WRC event, then asked every single competitor in the national event to go over the podium. Then that was it, everything over. I ran over to ask if they’d forgotten about us and the rest, and were told no that was it and the wrc promotors didn’t want anyone else going over the podium. So that was it, no chance to celebrate, no chance for a photo on the podium, just a nondescript finish by parking in parc ferme. After going over the podium in 2022 and getting a half decent trophy, I just felt totally deflated and really felt like they didn’t want us there and couldn’t care less about us. I went over and discussed the situation with the event secretary, who said there wasn’t an overall trophy for our position, and she couldn’t find the non-priority trophies (great). We did get a trophy for 11th in the KNRC event which is utterly ridiculous as reading all the details they should have been separate events, and I am nothing to do with the KNRC other than having a Kenyan driver. I’ve thrown it away. Of course the KNRC competitors are quite happy to say they did the “WRC Safari Rally” which is utter bullshit.

Frustrating end to a frustrating event for me, sadly. Won’t be in a rush to go back.

Have had a few days away in the Maasai Mara which I found much more enjoyable than the rally. If anyone gets the chance to go on Safari, please do it as its such an amazing experience.

Pics to follow when I can get some sorted.