Ascania Racing shakedown summary

Mentos Ascania Racing - shakedown is passed

Today participants of the 2nd stage of the P-WRC championship, Rally Vodafone de Portugal, tested theirs cars at the official shakedown. Two Mentos Ascania Racing crews also took part in these tests: Oleksandr Saliuk - Pavel Cherepin and Valeriy Gorban - Sergey Larens.

Top-drivers P-WRC showed very tight shakedown results: Patrik Flodin was the fastest - and had only one lap (3:28,8), Russian pilot Dmitry Tagirov had four laps and the best was wit 3:29,6 time, finally, 3rd position won Hayden Paddon (3:30.0). All of them had Subaru Impreza STi.

Ukrainian pilots finished shakedown with good results: Oleksandr Saliuk became the best and reached time 3:39.0, Yuri Protasov become a bit slower (3:44,4), and Valeriy Gorban got next result - 3:46,6.

Before first official results brought optimistic feeling for Ukrainian rally-fans, our team passed technical inspection and recce. All three Mentos Ascania Racing Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX passed successfully. And after Wednesday shakedown our crews made their first impressions about Rally Vodafone de Portugal - here Ukrainian team met very hard abrasive roads with sharp rocks, narrows parts, dangerous turns. This year total distance of Rally Vodafone de Portugal is 310 km, average SS length is about 20 km and the longest one, Santa da Serra, lasts 31 km. This race makes a very tough challenge for Mentos Ascania Racing - this is first gravel event in this season and we have to be as fastest and concentrated as possible from the start till the end.

-source: ascania racing