Italian rider Alessandro Botturi emerged winner of the enduro-style Sardegna Rally Race on Thursday after five days of excellent all-terrain riding on the beautiful Italian island.
Botturi, an experienced enduro competitor raced for the CF Racing team on a standard FE 450 and with the support of the Italian subsidiary Husqvarna Motorcycles Italia. He had a great all-round result, finishing in the top two on all five days to have an overall time of 15 hours 11.05, some seven minutes 44 ahead of Marc Coma and Gerrard Farres, both of Spain.
Botturi is currently competing in the Motorally Italian championship where riders compete on enduro bikes and navigate with road books, clearly the perfect training ground for the specialist Sardegna Rally Race.
Botturi said he has learned to navigate well and this paid off for him in the tricky conditions this week on the Italian island. “Here in Sardinia the navigation is rather amazing because of the special terrain and the incredible number of entries in the road book – for example 560 entries just for the fourth stage.”
“I think the secret to success is to maintain a very high level of concentration and to do this you have to forget about high speed and focus on the pace. The rhythm is the secret,” he added. “My best day was day four where I managed to gain some time. The opponents were very strong but they were also a bit unlucky. Marc (Coma) for example had some problems with his navigation device, and here in Sardinia you cannot give this advantage to your opponents.”
Botturi was overall second on Day One and Day Two and overall first on the last three days.
Final classification Sardegna Rally Race 2014
- Alessandro Botturi 15:11’05 ITA HUSQVARNA Team Husqvarna Italia
- Marc Coma +7’44 ESP KTM KTM Red Bull Rally Factory
- Gerard Farrés +12’21 ESP GAS GAS Gas Gas JVO Team
- Paulo Goncalves +22’50 PRT HONDA TEAM HRC
- Andrea Mancini +25’54 ITA BETA Team Dirt Racing Beta
- Olivier Pain +27’49 FRA YAMAHA Yamaha Racing
- Joan Barreda +35’11 ESP HONDA TEAM HRC
- Ruben Faria +35’35 POR KTM KTM Red Bull Rally Factory
- Armand Monleón +40’05 ESP KTM KTM Marc Coma Junior Team
- Joan Pedrero +41’15 ESP SHERCO Sherco Rally Factory
HRC Report
After obtaining several victories in the first two rounds of the Raids World Championship, the Team HRC put up a good fight to finish on the podium in the very complicated race in Sardegna. It was finally Paulo Goncalves who finished closest to the podium in fourth place.
The last stage of the Sardegna Rally Race has come to an end today in San Teodoro, with Paulo Goncalves taking the victory on the last Special. Gonçalves takes fourth place in the general standings of this rather particular rally. The Team HRC riders have continuously achieved partial wins but the final triumph seems to have eluded them this time. The team has previously won the first two races of the FIM Cross-Country Rallies World Championship.
The final day has once again been very intense for the riders of the team. Hélder Rodrigues, who was a serious podium contender today, was unable to join the fight after a stone got stuck between the chain and the rear sprocket, causing it to break.
Teammate Joan Barreda was also subjected to a series of difficulties; first by avoiding a head on collision with another rider during in the first part of the stage. Later, during the second part, he had a very serious scare whilst following the race leader Alessandro Botturi, unable to avoid a rock that was in his path due to the dust that the Italian rider was kicking up. The Spaniard was able to continue riding but unable to maintain the same pace he had before the incident.
Joan Barreda has taken seventh place of the seventh edition of the Sardegna Rally Race, ranking second in the provisional general standings of the Championship, with the same amount of points as teammate Paulo Gonçalves. The Portuguese rider aimed to gain positions. He had a complicated first part of the stage but things improved for him in the second part, and he registered the fastest time in the last 50 kilometers. ‘Speedy’ Goncalves has completed a remarkable rally even if the he was prevented from victory after the front brake problems suffered in the previous days during the crucial marathon stage.
The fifth round of the FIM World Championship Cross-Country Rallies will take the Team HRC to Brazil for the Rally Dos Sertoes, that will take between the 21st to 30th of August.
Paulo Goncalves 4th +22’50 Team HRC – “The Sardegna Rally is now over and I am happy with my performance, my navigation, with the CRF450R and the team. Everything worked great but unfortunately the marathon stage did not go well for us. I had two problems with the front brakes that I was unable to fix because we could not benefit from the team assistance at that time. I lost a lot of time during those days being unable to push. In the end I have finished in fourth place overall, it is a bad result. Other than that everything else worked perfectly, which shows that we can rely on the job we have done and the good feeling with the bike.”
Joan Barreda 7th +35’11 Team HRC – “It’s a pity I wasn’t able to achieve a better result today, I wanted to push and improve my race position. Yesterday my feeling was really good and I wanted to take advantage of it today – even if I was not completely comfortable riding in a particular race such as this one – I believe I could have had a good finish today. At the beginning of the Special I bumped into Faria, lost my concentration and after refueling I wanted to push but with the dust lifted up by Botturi´s bike I had a bit of a scare with a rock, forcing me to slow down.”
Helder Rodrigues DNF Team HRC – “The last day in Sardegna has been very good for me. I was feeling really positive; I had a good start and was in a prime position to fight for the podium. I went for it and pushed but halfway through the Special I had a problem with the rear sprocket. I think it might have been a small stone that probably got caught between the chain and the sprocket and I wasn’t able to finish the race. It is unfortunate for me because up to that point we had done a great job these past few days. We did a lot of work in order to be ready for the race and everything was going so well. We will continue fighting in the upcoming races to get better results in the future.”
Wolfgang Fischer Team HRC – Team Manager – “During the last day of the Sardegna Rally, all three riders continued fighting podium finishes. Paulo won the last Special of the day and finished fourth. Joan had a scare with another rider during the Special and luckily nothing came of it. Hélder had a technical problem with his rear wheel that prevented him from finishing the race. Generally speaking we are happy with the job the riders and the team have done. They have not been able to make it to the podium or win the rally but they have taken valuable points for the Championship. Barreda and Gonçalves are still serious contender for the title, currently in second and third place respectively. Next stop will be Brazil.”
Martino Bianchi Team HRC – General Manager – “The overall result here in Sardinia does not reflect the real work and performance of our HRC riders. We finished fourth with Gonçalves and seventh with Barreda, but we have seen the level of the riders was very high. We won two stages, one with Paulo and another Joan, who also won the prologue. They have fought for victory and were first and third after the second stage. But we’ve had a bit of bad luck. The third stage was difficult with many problems that ruined any chances of a podium for Paulo and Joan and the last day Hélder was really unlucky to break the rear sprocket. All we can say is that we have seen the level of our riders, very fast, in good rhythm and are in second and third place in the World Standings, with the same number of points and only seven points behind the new leader Coma. We knew tha t Sardinia was a great challenge and we have shown that we have a good team and a very good bikes.”
