RUST magazine: RUST#41

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FOLLOW THE LEADER
The tracks tell the story. Toby Price follows in the route
blazed by the early starters. The job for the entire rally
was to stay close, but never actually go fastest. A
broken wrist was the perfect excuse to do exactly that!
LIVING IN A BOX
Well, two boxes. This is the life of the Malle Moto rider. No
team truck, no mechanics. And no recognition. Who won
the class this year – do you know? See what we mean…
“NOT SINCE THE MAURITANIAN SPECIALS HAVE WE SEEN
THE RIDER OPENING THE PISTE LOSE SO MUCH TIME TO HIS
PURSUIVANTS, ‘THANKS’ TO HIS EASY TO FOLLOW TRACKS”
A TIGHT PACK
If the size of the entry was a pleasant
surprise for the organisers, the
closeness of the racing surprised no
one. The days of Despres / Coma
domination are now long gone, with
five factory teams (KTM, Husqvarna,
Honda, Yamaha and Sherco) all
entering serious candidates for
victory. The statistics speak for
themselves, with eight different stage
winners (at least one for each of the
factory teams) and five different
overall leaders. If the depth of field was
one reason no one dominated, the
other main factor was the Peruvian
sand and the race composition. Not
since the Mauritanian specials have
we seen the rider opening the piste
lose so much time to his pursuivants,
‘thanks’ to his easy to follow tracks. It
meant that the lead see-sawed back
and forward until two mass starts
redistributed the cards, something that
cost Sam Sunderland in particular a
great deal of time.
Pre-race a lot of people’s money
was on Adrien Van Beveren, who was
looking very strong last year until his
highly televised end of special crash.
Disappointingly for his Yamaha team
he looked less convincing in 2019
and won neither a special or lead the
overall before going out with a broken
engine. The man who replaced him
as the rider most likely to break KTM
/ Husqvarna’s strangle hold was the
American Ricky Brabec, until his
Honda engine also broke, while he was
holding an eight-minute overall lead.
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