Mohács Cup: It’s raining, man!

First of all I want to thank Dan for this opportunity. Maybe you will be interested in what’s going on in Europe and maybe you won’t get bored of my articles. Any compliments or criticism are heartily welcomed. Now enough babbling, let’s get to work.

Hungary - land of lowlands, thermal springs, well known Tokay wines and right-wing extremists. And also country with strong cross country rally scene. This year’s season consists of eight races, the first one has taken place on last weekend of March. Twenty eight cars lined up, half of them in T1 group in accordance with FIA regulations. The most numerous represented was Nissan with six cars, against them had stood three crews with Opel Antara/Chevrolet Captiva. Then there were two powerful BMW X5s and some others.

After short prologue the main competition has begun. Saturday’s tracks were all drenched by heavy rain which forced some crews to withdrawal. Károly Fazekas (read as Caaroy Fazekash) rolled his Chevy powered BMW X5 in deep ruts. Just few meters further ended first Nissan. Imre Varga (read as Eamre Waarga) buried his Kingcar (modified Navara) and burned the clutch. Newcomer to CCR multiple Hungarian rally champion Balázs Benik (Opel Antara RR) surprised everyone by winning first special with comfortable advantage. He also won last two specials of rally on Sunday but with huge penalty from previous day he finished last.

His teammate and boss Balázs Szalay (read as Balaash Salay) has been fighting hard for the first place with another rally driver Erik Korda (Nissan Navara) whole weekend. Szalay won two specials, Korda three and in the final, victory went to latter with margin of 1 min. 41 sec. Third was only Czech in race Zdeněk Pořízek with former X-Raid’s BMW X5 CC. Hungarian prominent TV commentator László Palik made a mistake which cost him and his SA ex-factory Navara podium place. Fifth came András Lukács (read as Andraash … eh, forget it) driving Hungarian-made prototype G.Baba Tdi.

Let’s take a look at the rest quickly. Hungarian Army Team driver Zoltán Bálint finished sixth with another Palik’s Navara, Pál Lónyai with a Nissan Hardbody Pickup seventh almost an hour back. Yet another Navara on eighth place thanks to Zoltán Morvai. Ninth was pair of famous (in Hungary of course) TV persons including the only woman in race Andre Várkonyi (Opel Antara). And last but one Zsolt Murczin came home with his 3D Proto (Mitsubishi L200 powered by, what a surprise… Chevy LS7 engine).

So this was the first race of Hungarian season, second was about to begin in two weeks time.

Photos: Nyúl Eszter, http://www.dakar.hu/