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Ever wonder what compares to the power and unpredictability of off-road truck racing? Our InstaForex team confirms that the Dakar Rally is a breathtaking event. This incredible tournament has been held in Saudi Arabia for the second year.
The start of the 43rd Dakar race took place in Jeddah. The participants also finished the competition there. The route, 7646 km long, was fraught with many dangers and adventures from the arid desert to the Red Sea.
42 teams took part in the reactive endurance competition. And only 20 were able to finish without serious damage.
It all started in May 2011 with the cooperation of InstaForex and the champions of the prestigious Silk Way Rally, the team of Ales Loprais. It was then that the name of the InstaForex Loprais team appeared. And the team captain Ales has been in the top 7 rally drivers for 7 years.
Let's go a little deeper into history. Ales's sports career began with his uncle, the famous Karel Loprais, a six-time rally winner. In 2006, Ales took part in the competition for the first time as a navigator in his uncle's team.
Karel Loprais is still a dangerous driver of the Dakar Rally: he posted the second-best result in the history of the race.
The main rivals of InstaForex Loprais are the works teams KamAZ-master, IVECO and MAN. Certainly, InstaForex crew has a hard time competing with them, considering that KamAZ has won 15 out of 18 races since 2001. At the same time, the team shows excellent results.
The 11 km long prologue started in Jeddah. InstaForex Loprais team, thanks to their confidence on the track, took sixth place.
The first stage: well-coordinated work and professionalism of the InstaForex Loprais Praga team brought it a well-deserved second place in the category of trucks. Even the crew of Ales Loprais, Khalid Alkendi and Petr Pokor did not expect this.
Second stage: the sand dunes became the main obstacle of the second stage. It took the team 11 minutes to repair the punctured tire. The result was a finish in ninth place.
The third stage: the desert warmly rewarded the race participants with sandy winds and huge dunes. But, thanks to invincible will, InstaForex Loprais team took fifth place.
Fourth stage: 813 km of the fourth stage became a real test for the race participants. They still had to fight the forces of the Saudi Arabian desert. Ales Loprais spoke about a confident start, rivalry with MAZ and a punctured tire.
The fifth stage of the track became really difficult for all Dakar participants. Obstacles arose literally from all sides: incredibly difficult navigation, unpredictable terrain, which not all teams coped with.
The stumbling block in the fifth stage was the navigation errors of many riders. For the same reason InstaForex Loprais lost 21 minutes to the leader and took only 15th place.
Mechanic Petr Pokora spoke about both the disappointment of the team at the fifth stage and the increased motivation and cohesion.
Having returned to the track, the InstaForex Praga team seemed to have risen from the ashes and began to confidently move towards the finish line. In the final 130 km, the athletes reduced the gap from the leader by 6 minutes and, together, finished in fifth place.
The obstacles of the fifth stage reduced the length of the 6th stage by 100 km. InstaForex team entered the competition with 3 KamAZ trucks, Aleksey Vishnevsky and MAZ from Belarus. All 6 athletes shared the finishing places with a gap of one minute. Thus, Ales's team took fifth place.
The next day, February 9, the participants had a day off. And immediately after the start of the Dakar marathon stage was announced. But even before the start of the race, Ales' team was in for an unpleasant surprise.
“The right front-wheel bearing is burnt out. The fire also destroyed the braking and pressurization systems. Thus, we could not adjust the tire pressure on the front axle until the end of the stage. We had to overcome the dunes, despite the fact that we had, for example, 4 atmospheres instead of 2 or even 1.5. So, when there was MAZ in front of us, Peter had to go out to manually deflate the tires, ” shared Ales Loprais.
But in spite of all adversity, the Praga V4S DKR truck, also known as The Lady, came to the finish line sixth, in a difficult struggle giving the championship to 4 factory KamAZ trucks and Alexei Vishnevsky with a factory MAZ.
The second track of the marathon stage of the Dakar Rally marked the beginning of an incredible new challenge for the team. According to the rules of the marathon, only the athletes themselves have the right to service the car. Thus, the InstaForex Loprais Praga team overcame a new obstacle, the replacement of almost the entire front axle of the Praga V4S DKR.
Mechanic Petr Pokora shared his impressions of how they coped with the repair and replacement of tires.
This chapter of the race brought Loprais a fierce competition with Ayrat Mardeev. InstaForex team managed to snatch 45 seconds from the KamAZ driver. At the same time, the athletes were able to break away from the catching team of Martin Masik by 22 minutes.
The ninth stage of the race foreshadowed team battles on the shores of the Red Sea. Loprais's crew crossed this segment of the competition without any problems. The team finished, keeping the result.
The tenth stage brought a new rivalry with 4 KamAZ trucks. The athletes finished behind the winners just 4 minutes behind. Praga's car worked 100%.
The eleventh stage showed a repetition of history. In last year's competition, Loprais's crew started the penultimate stage from fourth place, intending to get into the top three. But technical issues turned into a fiasco for the team.
This year, the Praga V4S DKR truck took fourth place again. Of course, the team tried to get ahead, but, contrary to hopes, this did not happen.
Due to the elimination of technical problems, the crew of Ales Loprais lost 26 minutes to the winner of the stage, Anton Shibalov, and dropped to 1 position in the overall standings.
The final stage of the Dakar Rally marked new challenges. Contrary to forecasts, some of the teams that took the lead were unable to finish the race. But thanks to well-coordinated professional work, InstaForex Loprais team managed to finish the race without critical errors.
“Today our crew and the Lady were working at their limit. We needed to catch up on the backlog that occurred due to technical problems. There were several sections on the route that were familiar to me, due to which I was able to overtake three trucks that started in front of us, ” explains Ales Loprais.
At the 99th kilometer, he was ahead of Dmitry Sotnikov in KamAZ by 2:42 minutes. Loprais also beat Martin Masik by 3:22 minutes, who finished fourth overall. But suddenly the front right tire could not bear the load and literally fell apart from the inside. After the repair, InstaForex Loprais team finished 8 minutes later than the winner, taking the fifth place in the overall standings.
According to the results of the competition, the first, second and third places were taken by the KamAZ-master teams. InstaForex Loprais team consisting of racer Ales Loprais, co-driver Petr Pokora and technician Khalid Alkendi in Praga V45 DKR truck finished 50 minutes after the start, having won 5th place in Rally Dakar 2021.
Despite all the obstacles, our team was confidently moving towards victory. On the track, the athletes showed the composure and skill inherent in real professionals. Thanks to these qualities, the team entered the top five of the strongest riders.
Only two hours separated the Loprais crew from the champion title, but there are still so many victories ahead!
