The category of the production cars is usually quite crowded at the Dakar, the less preparation of the vehicles makes it attractive for the amateurs and for not-so-amateurs, like Spain’s best T2 driver at the Dakar: Xavi Foj, who always finished among the best in the category of production cars, leaving aside the requalification last year by bureaucratic issues.
This category is not as spectacular as the big prototypes like the Mini All4 Racing, the BMW X3CCs or, now in past tense, the Volkswagen Race Touareg. Silk Way Rally has a massive number of T2 vehicles but with big differences in their chances. On the one hand we have the Nissan of Frederic Chavigny who came to Russia with the aim to do his best to grab the trophy for France. His closest rival, Russian Ilya Kuznetsov is almost two hours behind by now, he drives a Toyota VDJ200 prepared in Italy by Top Run Motorsport. Third at the moment is Leonid Petrov, also with a Toyota.
Behind the trio in front, Polish Aleksander Sachanbinski races another car of the Japanese brand – this is no surprise considering that this brand usually gives the majority of the T2 field at cross-country rallies. Fifth in the category is another Russian pairing, Aleksandr
Sokolov and Ilya Krupnov. Two positions behind them we find Juraj and Daniela Ulrich, a nice crew from Slovakia who are well known for our readers and who still persist in the race despite all the difficulties they had to face in the past days.
