adminToyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally -the country’s premier motorsport event – has this year been slated for the weekend of March 16 to 18 and will be staged in and around Harare.
This event will, for the second year running, act as the opening round of the eight-event FIA African Rally Championship 2012 series, which attracts the cream of the continent’s motor rallying drivers.
And according to a member of the local organising committee of the Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally, Mike Exton, more entries are expected from South Africa for this event compared to last year.
The Toyota Challenge Rally attracted only one entry from South Africa last year and it came from one of that country’s top drivers Schalk Burger (Junior) who was also making his debut appearance in the FIA ARC series.
But Exton said they were likely to have more South African competitors for this year’s event.
“Entries for the 2012 Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally have already opened and a lot of South Africans are interested in coming up here to compete in this event.
“In fact, we are expecting a lot more than normal entries from South Africa and it’s good news for us as this will bring stiff competition to this event,” Exton said.
Robson Maganezi, one of Zimbabwe’s top motor rally drivers who is based in South Africa, also said that a number of South African drivers were interested in competing in this year’s Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally.
“Already, I’ve had one enquiry from a South African driver and I’m made to understand that a lot more are willing to travel to Zimbabwe to compete in this year’s Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally.”
Maganezi also announced that he would be ending his one-year sabbatical from the sport when he returns to take part in this year’s Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally in March.
The Kempton Park-based driver was last behind the wheel in the 2010 season when he took part in the South African Rally Championship series.
And after he was pipped by top South African female driver Megan Verlaque for the N4 Class title in controversial circumstances at the end of the 2010 season, Maganezi decided to take a one-year sabbatical from motor rallying and was not in action for the whole of the 2011 season.
But the 35-year-old Zimbabwean driver recently indicated that he will soon be acquiring a new motor rally car – a Subaru – and will hit the road again this year, starting with the Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally.
“I’ll soon be getting another car, a Subaru, which I’ll bring up here for the Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally and after that I think I’ll be competing in the South African nationals and not in the main South African Rally Championship series.
“There’s a lot of fun competing in the national events in South Africa because they are open to any kind of a vehicle and one is not under pressure to produce results unlike in the South African Rally Championship series,” Maganezi said.
But it is the news that Maganezi will be joined a by a host of top South African rally drivers in this year’s Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally that should come as sweet music into the ears of the local organisers of this exciting three-day international motor racing event. Last year’s Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally attracted a field of 16 cars which included only four from outside this country.
South Africa’s Burger (Junior), Giancarlo Davite of Rwanda and the Zambian duo of Muna Singh and Mohammed Essa were the only foreign drivers who took part in last year’s event which was won by Zimbabwe’s motor rallying hotshot Conrad Rautenbach. Rautenbach romped to victory in the 2011 Toyota Zimbabwe Challenge Rally, opening his way to a very successful season in which he also clinched both the overall FIA ARC and South African Rally Championship series Drivers’ titles.
The talented 27-year-old driver will, however, not be returning to defend both these titles this year after announcing last week that he will be taking a one-year break from motor rallying.
Online Reporter