What South African Rally Raid Championship Round 3 Report
Where Jwaneneg, Botswana
When 23 – 25 June 2023
Community South Africa National
Lead car eliminated, but three strong Desert Race finishes
Red-Lined Motorsport was relieved to bring three of its five entries home in an extremely rough, tough and incredibly demanding Botswana Toyota 1000 Desert Race, and this after their lead car had been taken out by an unfortunate and unnecessary accident over the past weekend.
“That was an extremely tough race,” Red-Lined Motorsport team principal Terence Marsh pointed out. “Less than half the cars that started this event, finished in what proved to be a race of attrition. So we are happy to get three cars home in the end. It should really have been four finishers with two of these within the top 10 but we ended up losing out on a potential top 5 result due to a final loop accident.
“On the one hand, Johan de Bruyn and Gerhard Schutte propelled themselves into T1 class championship contention with an impressive fourth in class and eighth overall on their Botswana Desert 1000 debut. Our 18-year-old Red-Lined Academy driver Pim Klaassen impressed on his national debut alongside Wade Harris, and Gerhard and Rudi Heinlein delivered another steady performance to also finish their first Desert Race.
“The sad story however was Chris Visser and Albertus Venter’s Dragon Energy powered REVO T1+ being taken out on the final loop. They were badly rear ended while stationary at a mandatory road crossing stop. The impact destroyed the rear end of their race car and put an abrupt end to their top 5 charge.
“Nicolas Pienaar and Carl Swanepoel also endured a challenging weekend with their Super Energi powered REVO T1. Their race eventually came to an abrupt end on the final day when a high-speed puncture side tracked them into a concrete block, which tore left front wheel off their REVO.”
Johan de Bruyn and Gerhard Schutte were the best of the Red-Lined finishers in eighth overall and fourth in the FIA T1 class aboard their Red-Lined REVO T1. “We had a very good race,” Johan de Bruyn admitted. “It was a clean run besides the one puncture. This result sees us up to second in the T1 championship chase which ultimately was our target on my first time out in Botswana. So, all round a good outing on my Desert Race debut.”
Red-Lined Academy driver, Dutch teenager Pim Klaassen impressed as he overcame a few challenges to race home 6th in class and 20th overall on his Desert Race and South African Rally Raid debut aboard his DaklaPack Rallysport VK50. Father and son crew, Gerhard and Rudi Heinlein bounced back from a challenging Saturday to eventually finish 7th in class and 22nd overall after an otherwise untroubled race on their Desert Race debut aboard their Red-Lined VK56.
“While we are extremely disappointed with what happened to Chris Visser and Albertus Venter, let’s rather focus on the positives and salute our three pairings that managed to finish this incredibly tough event. Huge congratulations go to Johan and Gerhard, Pim and Wade, and Gerhard and Rudi on bringing it home in such technical and challenging terrain!” Terence Marsh explained.
“And as always, a really big shout out to our entire technical crew on another great performance in cold and demanding conditions. Now it is time to dust ourselves off and start gearing ourselves up for Rounds 4 and 5 of the Championship which takes place in Parys over the weekend of 18 and 19 August 2023.”
*Red-Lined Motorsport competes with premium strategic partners, the Penta Motor Group, BFGoodrich, Motul, Dragon Energy, OMP, ExpandaSign, Ingco Tools and Wheel Collision.
Issued on behalf of Red-Lined Motorsport
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