Before the final results were agreed across all four classes of vehicle, participants had to endure the final 13th stage, travelling between the Argentinian cities of Rosario and Buenos Aires. The final stage of Dakar was not too long or difficult, as is traditional. Those in the truck class were set to drive 174km of ‘special’ area, followed by a further 219km, but the stage was reduced due to bad weather (to just 34km of ‘special’ terrain).
Dutch Hans Stacey (Iveco) was the first to finish while Belarusian Sergey Vyazovich’s team (racing under the number 510) finished 10th: the best result to date for our crews. Sergey was joined by co-driver Pavel Garanin and mechanic Andrey Zhigulin. Meanwhile, driver Alexander Vasilevsky was aided by co-driver Valery Kozlovsky and mechanic Anton Zaporoshchenko (racing under number 535) to finish 13th. In 42nd place in the 13th stage was our Belarusian ‘fast vehicle’ driven by Vladimir Vasilevsky, with Dmitry Vikhrenko as co-driver and mechanic Alexey Neverovich (number 560).
Overall, in the truck class, Russian team KAMAZ-master took first place, with gold going to the leader of the majority of stages, Airat Mardeev. Silver was claimed by Eduard Nikolaev and bronze by last year’s Dakar winner, Andrey Karginov. Belarus’ best MAZ-SPORTauto result belongs to Alexander Vasilevsky, for his 10th place.
Sergey Vyazovich’s team took 34th place overall, with the 510 crew several times achieving 2nd or 3rd place in a stage of the race. Sadly, mechanical trouble in the 8th stage prevented the squad from having a chance at a medal. Driver Vladimir Vasilevsky was 41st overall.
By Igor Leshin
