RICHARD Slamet and his navigator Wiets Coetzee were declared the winners of the Total Tara Rally late on Saturday night after confusion and controversy delayed the announcement for several hours.
In an incredibly close finish, Slamet, riding in a Toyota RunX, finished eight seconds ahead of Wilro Dippenaar and Riaan van der Westhuizen in a Ford Fiesta.
Dippenaar and Van der Westhuizen however queried the results and made an official protest and rally fans were kept waiting for hours as the organisers tried to resolve the issue.
Dippenaar eventually withdrew from the rally and Slamet and Coetzee were finally announced the winners, well after 22h00 on Saturday evening.
With Dippenaar’s withdrawal, Slamet and Coetzee were announced the winners, having covered the 25-stage rally in an overall time of two hours 45 minutes 38 seconds, with Rian Kritzinger and Lesley Morkel in a Nissan coming second 3:12:25 and Jan Everson and Fanie Botes third in VW Polo in 3:17:33.
It was a remarkable victory for Slamet and Coetzee who had to overcome several setbacks along the way.
“It was a tough rally and it was amazing that we could even finish, because we had gearbox problems. The car’s second gear stripped on Friday night and from then on we had to ride without second gear till the finish,” Slamet said.
“On the last stage we narrowly missed an accident after we had to swerve out for a municipal bus that turned onto our path,” Coetzee added.
Coetzee, who is a news editor at One Africa, only started racing last year after being invited by Slamet to become his navigator.
“We had a motor racing programme called Wheels on One, which was presented by Richard so that’s how we met and became friends. Later he asked me if I would be his navigator so I agreed and we started racing together for the first time last year. Last year’s Total Tara was specially disappointing because our car broke down only 300 metres after the start,” he said.
As usual, the rally was extremely tough and numerous competitors had to withdraw due to mechanical problems. The defending champions Japie van Niekerk and Gerhard Snyman who had won the rally the previous two years, were not so lucky this time around as they were disqualified from the race.
Their car broke down on Stage Nine outside Okahandja on Friday afternoon and they received illegal assistance while the stage was still on were summarily disqualified. The South African duo were visibly upset and returned to South Africa a few hours later.
In the end, only nine of the original 20 cars managed to finish the rally.
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