The Hustopeče pair Martin Rada – Jaroslav Jugas managed all the pitfalls of the 90th year of the famous RMC and climbed to the finish ramp for the sixth time in history.
With the special Abarth 124 Rally, she took 45th place, finishing fifth in her RGT class.
The last day of the Monte Carlo Rally was marked by four special stages. They drove closer to Monaco again, in the Maritime Alps. The competition was run in nice weather, so Martin Rada and Jarda Jugas once again reached for the super-soft and soft slick, which had already worked for them in the previous days.
“It simply came to our notice then. Although it was mostly dry, but especially in places where the sun did not shine, black asphalt bothered us many times, in other words ice sheets. We wore a super soft compound on the front again, soft on the back. The most treacherous was probably the passage to the goal of the second rehearsal section, Entrevaux. There it was a lot under the ice, even behind the fleeting target at the stop sign. Due to the running order, we checked our position today, we basically had no one to fight with, where to move. And we wanted to avoid unnecessary mistakes. “ concludes Martin Rada.
Martin Rada and navigator Jaroslav Jugas thus continued their previous successful performance at the Monte Carlo Rally. The Hustopeče team, together with Alfa Romeo, managed to conquer the competition five times out of six starts. However, this year was a premiere after a six-year hiatus, as the AGROTEC Czech Abarth Team set off on the tracks of the 90th year of the Monaco competition with the Abarth 124 Rally. The South Moravian pair managed to improve the respectable statistics when they did not hesitate during their next start, the joint sixth. Martin Rada and Jaroslav Jugas will return to Hustopeče with 45th place overall, fifth in the RGT class. As expected, the French “alpines” dominated the classification.
“We are just happy. It was my seventh start, from which it came six times to the finish. And navigator Jarda Jugas has similarly successful statistics. Although the competition lacked snow this time, it was again faster overall. It was extremely difficult to start at Lucerama and Col de Turini. The next two days were a little under a hundred sharp kilometers, we sat in the car for 12-13 hours. The speeds were generally very demanding, on narrow roads, difficult to beat, sometimes high in the mountains. From turn to turn, as every year. But we managed everything successfully. The fact that we did not have a single problem with our abartha in the process was also significant. Everything worked perfectly, I want to thank the members of the team and everyone who participated in the preparation. During the competition, we only changed the tires and checked the brakes, “ says Martin Rada, who will focus on the starts in the Czech Championships in the spring months.
The winner of the 90th Monte Carlo Rally was the French duo Sébastien Loeb – Isabelle Galmiche (Ford Puma WRC), when their biggest rival Sébastien Ogier slowed down the defect in the last stage and lagged behind by 10.5 seconds in the finish. Third place went to Craig Breen and Paul Nagl with another bomb.
