Krzysztof Hołowczyc has once again mastered his home rally. Together with navigator Łukasz Kurzeja, the Pole won the eighteenth edition of the AKPOL Baja Poland in the X-raid MINI JCW Rally 3.0i, his eleventh victory in the event and his tenth with an X-raid car. Michał Małuszyński and Julita Małuszyńska (Toyota Hilux EVO) finished second, with Adam Kuś and Maciej Giemza (Taurus EVO MAX) third. Kuś and Giemza thereby also claimed victory in the Challenger class of the FIA European Baja Cup, while Portuguese pairing Paulo Rodrigues and Fausto Mota in the BRP Can-Am Maverick R won the SSV category.
The rally, run from 27 to 30 August around Szczecin and the Drawsko Pomorskie military training ground, counted as the fourth round of the FIA European Baja Cup. Dutch crews were unfortunately not on the entry list this year. Even so, with 194 participants from 13 countries, the AKPOL Baja Poland was once again one of the best attended events on the European calendar. The entry list featured 28 crews, split across 16 vehicles in the Ultimate class, eight in Challenger and four in SSV. All four leaders of the interim Baja Cup standings were at the start: Rodrigues (148 points, SSV), Benediktas Vanagas (132, Ultimate), Karel Trněný (130, Ultimate) and Magdalena Zając (115, Ultimate T1.1).
Tyre trouble and a counterattack in Drawsko
Friday’s prologue in Szczecin went to Kuś and Giemza, who at 7:23.2 were just slightly faster than Hołowczyc and Kurzeja (2.3 seconds) and Vanagas and Paliukenas (5.1 seconds). Because the prologue does not count towards the general classification, the result only determined the starting order for Saturday. Kuś chose starting position four, which meant Hołowczyc and Kurzeja had to open the dusty Drawsko Pomorskie course first, usually a disadvantage on these loose tracks.
That disadvantage was confirmed on the first of three stages on the military ground: Hołowczyc had to stop at kilometre 44 for a tyre change and lost about three minutes as a result. Even so, the damage was limited to fourth fastest, 27.6 seconds behind Kuś and Giemza, who won the stage ahead of Bartłomiej Kotwica and Arkadiusz Jędrzejewski (Taurus T3 Maxx) and the Małuszyński duo. On the second stage Hołowczyc struck back with the fastest time, well over four minutes quicker than both Vanagas and the Małuszyńskis, jumping from fourth to first place. On the third and final stage on Saturday he confirmed his pace and ended the day with almost six minutes in hand over Małuszyński and seven minutes over Kuś.
Hołowczyc seals it on Sunday
On the final day the field ran the short, technical Sławoszewo, Wołczkowo, Szczecin stage twice. Hołowczyc and Kurzeja won both stages, the first by 1.5 seconds over Kuś and Giemza, the second by 15.1 seconds over Mariusz Wiatr and Łukasz Łaskawiec (Ford F150 EVO+). The final time of 3:57:24.2 gave Hołowczyc and Kurzeja a margin of 6:36.1 over the Małuszyńskis and 7:27.7 over Kuś and Giemza. Of the five special stages, they won four.
In the FIA European Baja Cup, Vanagas was the best of the regular championship drivers in fourth place, 7:51.6 behind the winner. Wiatr and Łaskawiec came fifth despite a crash on Saturday’s opening stage, ahead of Kotwica and Jędrzejewski, Miroslav Zapletal and Marek Sýkora, and Włodzimierz Grajek and Szymon Marciniak. In the SSV class, Rodrigues confirmed his championship lead with the class win, twelfth in the general classification. Ernest Kuś and Grzegorz Szymański finished second in SSV.
Tough weekends for the title contenders
Not everything went smoothly. Ekström and Bergkvist did not take the start, so one of the most closely watched names in the field dropped out before the prologue. Zając, fourth in the interim Baja Cup standings before the rally, lost a huge amount of time on the second stage and then retired, a setback for her points position. Murat Kapanoglu too, in the top five of the standings with 108 points, had a difficult rally and crossed the finish as the last classified crew with an enormous deficit. Former Dakar winner Matthias Walkner, this time on four wheels in a BRP Can-Am Maverick X3 XRS Turbo RR, was not classified after a series of time losses.
Sesks and Zarins set the fifth fastest time on Saturday before a heavy impact damaged the steering housing and a wheel, bringing the day to a premature end. The pair resumed on Sunday and finished 21st. Several crews, including the Latvian debutant, posted strikingly long, round times on the classification list on Saturday, an indication that navigation on the military training ground was difficult to follow for part of the field. Maria Gameiro and Annett Quandt, in the second X-raid MINI, also picked up a time penalty on the opening day for missing waypoints and got no further than seventeenth place. There was also a scare reported shortly after the last special stage: at Vanagas and Paliukenas a hydraulic line flew against the hot exhaust and briefly caught fire at a time control, the fire was quickly extinguished and the car still reached the finish.
Looking ahead to Baja España Aragón
For the FIA European Baja Cup the next round is already two weeks away, the Baja España Aragón from 10 to 13 September, followed by the Baja TT Sharish in Portugal. Rodrigues heads there as SSV classification leader, Vanagas strengthened his position as the best regular Ultimate title contender with his result in Poland, while Zając and Kapanoglu will have to make up ground on points after a disappointing weekend in Szczecin.
The results listed above are the final classification published by the race organisation; as usual, these may still undergo a small change after any appeals.
