Silk Way 2011 Rally reaches finishing line

SOCHI, July 17 (Itar-Tass) -- After seven days racing and a total of
3,983 kilometers the competitors in the 3rd Silk Way Rally on Saturday
reached their finishing line in the Russian Black Sea resort city of Sochi.
Pole Krzysztof Holowczyc of the German BMW team won the race in the
car category. A tandem of Russian Alexander Zheludov and Belarusian Andrei
Rudnitsky finished third in the jeep category. Ales Loprais from the Czech
republic (Tatra) took a reward in the truck category, beating Russia's
Kamaz team. Russian Firdaus Kabirov (Kamaz) was handed a one hour penalty
for speeding during the transfer in Stavropol.
In an interview with Itar-Tass, Khabirov said he saw the Kamaz result
as an achievement anyway. "All the Kamaz truck reach the finishing line.
Any race for us is a training for the Dakar," he said and added that his
team developed the maximal speed at the finishing stage of the race.
The 2011 Silk Way Rally Dakar series with prize fund of 300,000 U.S.
dollars started at the very heart of Moscow, on the Red Square, on July 9.
This year 140 teams from 20 countries took part in the rally. The rally
route passed thorough Lipetsk, Volgograd, Astrakhan, Stavropol, Maikop and
finished in Sochi, the future capital of winter Olympic games 2014.
This rally was the third one. The first race was held in 2009 with the
route Kazan - Ashgabat. In 2010, the rally started from Russia's second
largest city St. Petersburg and finished also in Sochi.