Safari Rally 2000
LEG ONE
All teams except Hyundai started the toughest rally of the WRC calendar this year. For Peugeot this was the first African event with the 206. Seat's Toni Gardemeister's first Safari adventure didn't start too well, as he crashed his Seat heavily during pre-race testing on Wednesday. Co-driver Paavo Lukander hurt his neck and the car damaged badly in a three meter high jump which landed nose first. The car was repaired in time, though, and Lukander's neck wasn't too badly hurt, either, so the pair started the event.
Fastest on the first competitive stage of the rally was Gardemeister's team-mate Didier Auriol. Tommi Makinen and Richard Burns were very close, but many drivers had problems already on the first stage. Animals wandering on the road were also a problem for some drivers, for example Juha Kankkunen.
On the second stage Tommi Mäkinen suffered three punctures and after the stage the car stopped with an electrical failure, possible caused by the pounding from driving with punctured tyres. This meant that Mäkinen was out of the rally in a very early stage. Richard Burns was fastest on SS2 and took the lead. Juha Kankkunen and Didier Auriol were battling over the second position, but on SS3 Kankkunen took firm hold of the second place. Burns was again fastest, as was the case on the final stage of the day, SS4.
Almost all drivers, with the exception of the Subarus, experienced punctures or other problems on the first leg. Gardemeister had an off, losing 20 minutes and the driver side door, which made the rest of the stage quite dusty for him. After the second stage Seat withdrew Gardemeister as the conditions proved too hard for co-driver Lukander's injured neck.
Michelin-shod drivers, like Carlos Sainz of Ford and Tommi Makinen of Mitsubishi critisized that the Frech tyres were unusable in the African conditions. The mousse inside puncture-proof tyres becomes too hot and can't hold the tyre together, so most teams do not use them. As a result, Ford drivers Sainz and McRae were quite far from the leaders already after the first leg and Makinen was out. Makinen said that they have been asking for better tyres for the Safari from Michelin since year 1996, but no improvement has been seen.
Second fastest on the final stage of the day was, quite surprisingly Norwegian Ford-driver Petter Solberg, who rose into the 4th spot in the rally beating the official works Fords. The overnight top three is populated by cars using Pirelli tyres with Subaru's Burns in the lead. Kankkunen is second, four minutes behind Burns and Auriol is seven and a half minutes behind the leader. Solberg and McRae (5th) are already more than 13 minutes behind.
Situation after leg one, 4 out of 12 competitive sections driven:
1. Richard Burns (ENG) Subaru - 2.40.22,0
2. Juha Kankkunen (FIN) Subaru +4.01,0
3. Didier Auriol (FRA) Seat +7.37,0
4. Petter Solberg (NOR) Ford +13.17,0
5. Colin McRae (SCO) Ford +13.33,0
6. Toshihiko Arai (JPN) Subaru +17.14,0
7. Marcus Grönholm (FIN) Peugeot +19.13,0
8. Freddy Loix (BEL) Mitsubishi +19.48,0
9. Carlos Sainz (ESP) Ford +24.53,0
10. Armin Schwarz (GER) Skoda +25.20,0
