Next Stage... Rali Transibérico

[derco]

Hi to all.

The next race in schedulle in the FIA Cross-Country Rally World Cup will be the "Rali Transibérico", disputed in is biggest part in Portugal, but also going to spain for two short special stages on day 3 of the race.
The race will have almost 1500kms of special stages, and it will start on day 21 of May and en in the 28. This will be the only race of the FIA Cross-Country Rally World Cup disputed in Europe.
For the moment we have news confirming the engagement of Mitsubishi ( 3 cars with at least one of the new MPR14 Diesel), and X-Raid (X-Raid have 2 costumers in Portugal that have bought 2 X3 CC ) with acording to some unconfirmend infos, will have 5 cars racing in this event (2 costumers + 3 official drivers -- unconfirmed).
In this event also enter the best european offroad drivers, and this was the last race of Sir Colin McRae, before his dead in one helicopter crash last year.
Also, a great part of the caravan of this rally is composed by the very competitive local drivers, wich have one of the best groups of cars in Europe in this kind of racing. Names like Barbosa, Filipe Campos, J.Ramos, Gameiro, Grancha, will much probably give a hard fight for the top 10.
This event counts for the FIA Cross-Country Rally World Cup , for the Portuguese Championship, and also for the Spanish Championship.
I leave here some images from last year's race:

[FlyHiFlyLo]

Cool... They should just leave BJ there...

[derco]

Hi.

It will be fantastic if we could have 1 of the hummers in this race. Around here, the Hummer had a built a reputation and a huge group of fans in the Dakar 2006 and 2007. But unfortanly that will not happen... :(

But the fact is that the hummer have a few details that aren't good for this race, and in the direct confront with Mistsubishi, VW and even X-Raid the hummer it will probably lose. The first is the size of the car, very wide for some of the roads. The other detail is the fact it has only 2 whell drive; - That river in my photos is just impossible for the hummer. Finnaly i think the very spectacular kind of driving of the hummer drivers ,here couldn't produce good results, unless they are in the wood cutting bussiness, because there are lot's of trees in some areas, and going sideways like they go, it only could get them some nasty crash.

Regards.

[michael_loomis]

sounds like a challenge to me...

[derco]

:D it could be... if that makes them leave BJ or Rg enter the race, we will love to see them in action.

But it's most probable that all the montains get flaten then the Hummer's race in Transibérico. Even the portuguese round of the Dakar Series, that will be raced in September i think they will not come .

[cancinoj]

do they race in rally cars o rally boats???

[derco]

Hi.

In fact in some few river crossings the drivers will much probably wish to have a boat. But they don't have it, so the better way many times is flat out over the water :)

But the reason for the images to be from places with water is very simple. In the time of the year they run the Transibérico, the soil is very dry, and in the biggest part of there are lots of dust, so i must go to places where i can get good and clean images, this is generaly in the river crossings. Also, in that places is generaly where the action is more fun to watch.

Regards.

[derco]

Hi to all

The race is almost in the road. In the next week the menu reserved for the drivers includes 5 days of racing, with 9 special stages, most of them with near 200km in lenght. The total of racing will be around 1500kms, and the total route will be around 2600kms.
The race starts next wednesday, and it will end next sunday after a 5 days of exciting race in the tracks of Portugal and Spain.
The main teams will be Mistsubishi and BMW X-Raid, the first with 3 cars and the second with 5 cars.

More infos in www.offroadphoto.com (portuguese or spanish readers) or www.ralitransiberico.com

I leave here the full map of the race.


Regards.

[derco]

Hi.

We allready have started the upload of the images from the Transibérico 2008, at this moment we allready have more then 350 images on-line, but there are still much more to come.
They can be found in www.offroadphoto.com.

The highlight of this race was with no doubt the extraordinary performance of Nasser Al-Attiyah. Just amazing. This guy cand drive fast on mud, sand , water, rocks... just give i'm a car and we will do one fantastic show. I hope he returns to Portugal fast.

Regards

[derco]

Hello


Finnaly i can managed to get some time to upload the videos from Transibérico to youtube.

So here are the 3 short movies we have done in this race.

The first and second movies are in the same Special Stage, but in diferent spots of the loop around Coruche.

The third movie, is in the same spot of the first, but in the second special stage of the day, and recorded from the oposite side of the river.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mixRCprnNQ


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfwxSb6Pz_Y


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acC0Ozwssdc

Photos and infos could be found in www.offroadphoto.com or in www.ralitransiberico.com

[derco]

Hello.

Here are some examples of the "action" in the portuguese roads in june.

Regards.

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss3/imagens/img003.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss3/imagens/img003c.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss3/imagens/img008.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss6/imagens/img001c.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss6/imagens/img005.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss6/imagens/img018e.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss6/imagens/img031d.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss7/imagens/img002.jpg

http://www.offroadphoto.com/images/provas/transiberico2008/ss7/imagens/img005b.jpg

More images avaiable in http://www.offroadphoto.com , galerias, rali transibérico.