Baja Poland: Kuba Przygonski finishes 2nd in MONI John Cooper Works
· Przygonski consolidates his 2nd position in the FIA World Cup standings
The FIA Cross Country Rally World Cup slowly but surely is approaching the end of its 2017 season. In the ninth of the 11 World Cup rounds, the young Pole Kuba Przygonski and his Belgian co-driver Tom Colsoul finished runner up, with their MINI John Cooper Works Rally, behind the winner Nasser Al-Attiyah. Krzysztof Holowczyc and Lukasz Kurzeja (both POL) encountered a difficult rally and finished 13th.
On Saturday, the pairings had to contest two 216-kilometre special stages, held on military premises located near Drawsko Pomorskie about an hour from the city of Szczecin . Due to the heavy rain that had fallen on the previous days, the competitors had to cope with a lot of mud and water crossings. Przygonski delivered in fine style, in the two Saturday special stages. Only once, he lost as few minutes due to a damaged tyre. At the end of the day he held second position in the overall standings. On Sunday, the schedule featured another four special stages but with their lengths of 10 and 18 kilometres they were too short to offer a pairing the chance of gaining time. Consequently, Przygonski came second in his home rally. “It was a really nice rally for us and we had a great battle with Nasser” said the Pole. “The MINI was perfectly prepared but unfortunately we lost time because of two punctures. I’m delighted with having made it to the podium.”
Krzysztof Holowczyc, however, who held third position after the first special stage on Saturday, had to cope with a major dose of bad luck. In the afternoon he was stopped by a wheel problem and had to return to the service park early – and due to the time penalty he received for doing so he dropped out of the top 10. On Sunday he impressed with great special-stage results, thus demonstrating what would have been possible. In the end, he finished 13th. “I’m happy that I was able to match the pace of the front-runners,” revealed Holowczyc who won the fourth special stage. “Today we raced just for ourselves as becoming a factor in the battle for the overall win was impossible anymore.”
The next rally that will be contested by the X-raid team will be the ‘Rallye du Maroc’ (4th – 10th October.2017).
Baja Poland overall after SS7
1st N. Al-Attiyah (QAT) / M. Baumel (FRA) Toyota – 5h 45m 40s
2nd J. Przygonski (POL) / T. Colsoul (BEL) MINI John Cooper Works Rally – 5h 49m 34s
3rd B. Ten Brinke (BEL) / S. Prevot (BEL) Toyota – 5h 59m 25s
4th V. Vasilyev (RUS) / K. Zhiltsov (RUS) MINI ALL4 Racing – 6h 03m 06s
5th A. Domzala (POL) / S. Gospodarczyk (POL) Toyota – 6h 03m 32s
…
13th K. Holowczyc (POL) / L. Kurzeja (POL) MINI John Cooper Works Rally – 11h 27m 29s
