Rising from the ashes
KYALAMI - Motorite Racing BAT Venom recently killed the competition, skidding ahead of the pack in this year’s special vehicles category of Toyota’s 1000 Kalahari Botswana Desert Race, the third leg of the 2015 Donaldson Cross Country Championship.
Motorite duo Danie Stassen and Evan Hutchison exorcised last year’s demons after their car caught fire and forced them to retire in the third leg. Now they have the overall lead in the current series.
Stassen and Hutchison moved into the lead on the second day of the race, finishing just over five minutes ahead of their closest competitors, Mark Corbett and Juan Mohr of Century CR5.
“It was hectic out there with plenty of dust,” Hutchinson explained.
“We had a close shave in the dust at a road crossing, but apart from that we had a good run.”
They were slowed down briefly when a desert thorn tree damaged their vehicle’s bodywork, but aside from this delay, the race was as smooth as a tarred road for Hutchison and Stassen.
“Our biggest issue was contending with that bitter memory from last year – the closer it got, the more we just wanted to finish,” Stassen said.
“But winning today was like winning two years in one, knowing that we had just as good a run as we did last year, but this time we went all the way.”
The next round of the Donaldson Cross Country Championship is the Malelane 450 in Mpumalanga from 7 to 8 August.
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