• Abu Issa in the Buggy
This year, the competitors even will have to contest a marathon stage where the pairings will have to spend the night without their service crews. X-raid will travel to Morocco with five MINI ALL4 Racing vehicles and the CBRA Buggy. Yazeed Al-Rajhi (KSA) / Timo Gottschalk (GER), Mikko Hirvonen (FIN) / Michel Périn (FRA), Orlando Terranova (ARG) / Paulo Fiúza (POR), Kuba Przygonski (POL) / Tom Colsoul (BEL) and Boris Garafulic (CHL) / Filipe Palmeiro (POR) will contest the event with the MINI ALL4 Racing while Qatar’s Mohamed Abu Issa will drive the buggy.
Al-Rajhi and his navigator focused on the long desert rallies, this year. Apart from the Italian Baja, he contested the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, the Sealine Rally in Qatar, the Silk Way and now, as conclusion of the season, the Rallye du Maroc. For Hirvonen who celebrated his first cross-country rally win in the Hungarian Baja and for Périn, the event in Morocco also will represent the final preparation for the Dakar in January in competitive conditions.
Argentinean Terranova also is going to contest the last event prior to the Dakar that will be contested to a large extent in his home country Argentina. He will race together with Fiúza, a navigator he already cooperated with in 2013 and 2014 when they secured two fifth places at the Dakar Rally. Przygonski also makes use of this opportunity to contest a longer rally. To date, the Pole only competed in the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge and – of course – in the Baja Poland, this year. For Chilean Garafulic and Palmeiro it’s the second joint appearance this year in the MINI ALL4 Racing as they also contested the Baja Poland, together. New in the X-raid camp is Qatar’s Mohamed Abu Issa who will drive the buggy. The 26-year old was a quad racer, so far, and finished fourth in the 2014 Dakar.
The rally will start on 02nd October at Agadir with a seven-kilometre Super-Special. On the following day, the drivers will have to contest a special stage on a loop around the city located at the sea before the third special stage will take them to the dunes. There, they will have to attend to their cars alone, in the night, without the support of their service crews who already are on their way to Erfoud in the heartland were the pairings will meet their service crews again on 05th October. On the following two days, the bivouac will remain at Erfoud where the rally also will be finished on 07th October. Altogether, the drivers will have to cover 1.885 kilometres, with 1.317 kilometres representing the special-stage distance.
