Dippenaar, Bathfield dominate Shell V-Power Swakop Rally

Wilro Dippenaar emerged victorious in the S4 passenger class, while Loic Bathfield won the off-road division for pick-ups at the third leg of the Shell V-Power Swakopmund Rally on Saturday.

In the passenger vehicle section, Zachary Martin and Anique Schoeman came second overall in an S2-class Volkswagen Polo, while Peer Rohm and Pieter Steyn clinched the third position with 1:03:38 in an S1-class Volkswagen Polo.

Martin also came first in the S2 class.

In the off-road division, Bathfield and Johan Steyn’s crowd-pleasing CR1-class Century Racing CR-6, finishing with 57 minutes 18 seconds on the stopwatch, was too fast for Morne Oosthuizen and Jacques Kruger’s CR1-class Zarco, which came second with 1:09:59.

Werner Bartsch and Christel Fourie clinched third place in their CR2 Ford Courier.

Dippenaar and his co-driver, Carolyn Swan, covered the rally with their S4 class Ford Fiesta R5 in 55 minutes 11 seconds.

The rally organized and hosted by the Walvis Bay Motor Club under the auspices of the Namibia Motorsport Federation, saw a total of 15 participants competing for the best time.

This year’s rally also saw an all-women’s team competing for the first time. The drivers competed in five different classes namely S4, S2, S1, CR1 and CR2.

Exciting race

Dippenaar, who also won overall second place last year, described his experience as an exciting one.

“We tried to keep it as clean as possible in the beginning – avoiding punctures. I am happy with our overall performance from start to finish.

“The car worked great. We had a small issue that we figured out and will sort out before the next event,” he said.

Amazing race

Zachary Martin, the son of reigning champion said Allan Martin, said it was a short but amazing rally.

“The stages consisted of short and long courses, especially toward Nonidas, outside Swakopmund. Some stages were really sandy, while others were really rough – too rough for some cars that didn’t get to complete all 10 stages,” Zachary said.

Success

Wido Bartsch, chairperson of the WBMC, said it was a great event.

“Due to some rough roads, only 11 out of the 15 cars that entered completed all 10 stages. This indicates a successful event. No accidents were reported. which is always a plus at events such as this.”

Bartsch added that the rally was supposed to take part earlier this year, however, due to some issues, it had been postponed."

This event served as leg 3 of the 2023 Namibian championship series of six events.

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