Silk Way Rally 2017 – Leg 6: Semey - Urdzhar

Silk Way Rally 2017 – Leg 6: Semey - Urdzhar

• Despite a difficult Leg 6, Bryce Menzies / Peter Mortensen retain third place overall.
• Yazeed Al Rajhi / Tom Colsoul complete Leg 6 in sixth place and break into the top 15 leaders.

Munich. American duo Bryce Menzies and co-driver Peter Mortensen (MINI John Cooper Works Rally #105) successfully completed Leg 6 in 11^th place and maintain third in the overall rankings. The change in terrain as the Silk Way Rally 2017 moves further east across the Kazakhstan plains is also starting to be a factor for all competitors in this famous cross-country race to China.

Leg 6 saw the competitors taking on a special stage of 387.86km across dry and dusty tracks that also included small rocks. It was these rocks and heavy dust that led to a puncture to the Americans’ MINI John Cooper Works Rally and subsequent delay – enough to place the Silk Way Rally newcomers just outside of the top ten in 11^th place at the end of Leg 6.

Menzies: “Stage 6 was really fast and we went really good at the beginning. We caught the first few cars in front of us. Then we ended up getting a mystery flat tyre and this kind of set us back a little bit. We then got caught up behind some cars and it was really dusty. We fought the dust but it held us up to the end of the race. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s race.”

Yazeed Al Rajhi (KSA) and Tom Colsoul (BEL) maintained their impressive climb up the leader board with another dazzingly display of experienced and fast rally driving. At the end of the special stage they had placed their X-raid Team MINI JOHN Cooper Works Rally car (#101) sixth across the day’s finish line. Presently they are placed 15^th overall in the rankings.

Colsoul: “Today was a completely different stage to yesterday. We had a flat tyre after 7k – we hit a stone. Then I couldn’t get the wheel off so we worked for five-to-eight minutes to get it off and get a new wheel on. After that we didn’t actually push because the result for this stage was already set. So it wasn’t a fantastic day but not a dramatic day.”

Tomorrow’s Leg 7, Urdzhar - Karamay, features a shorter (412.90km) race distance as the competitors cross the Kazakhstan border and into China.

Silk Way Rally 2017: Ranking after Leg 6