SAFARI RALLY KENYA (25-28 February)
1999 FIA WORLD RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 3

MITSUBISHI MAINTAINS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP LEAD
WITH SAFARI RALLY SECOND PLACE

MITSUBISHI LANCERS 1st AND 2nd IN GROUP N

Marlboro Mitsubishi Ralliart has maintained its comfortable lead in the 1999 FIA World Rally Championship with a fine second place on Kenya’s Safari Rally. Finland’s Tommi Makinen set the pace for much of the rally to maintain his team’s superb recent record and its lead in both the World Rally Championship for Drivers and Manufacturers. A Mitsubishi Lancer has won the Group N production class, with Oman driver Hamed Al-Wahaibi.

Tommi Makinen and co-driver Risto Mannisenmaki finished less than eight minutes behind overall winner Ford’s Colin McRae but well ahead of top-class opposition from Toyota and Seat.

"We tried our best to win but we lost time on the first leg. It is really flat out all the time on this rally. It was incredibly hard. Second place is a good result in such tough conditions. Fortunately we had no serious problems, the car was very strong," Makinen said.

"You’ve got to praise Tommi for the way he’s handled himself. To recover as he did after a difficult start shows how determined he is: it’s been a fantastic effort, dust has been a major problem. The rally is now quite short making it hard to regain lost time. Once again the Lancer Evolution has been incredibly reliable - with two wins and a second place in three rallies we’ve done pretty well," said Marlboro Mitsubishi Ralliart team director Andrew Cowan.

An exciting battle for the Group N crown was one of the highlights of the last leg. Marlboro Middle East driver Hamed Al-Wahaibi started the day under two minutes ahead of fellow Lancer Evolution drive Luis Climent of Spain - a tiny gap in Safari terms. Climent closed in at first, but Al Wahaibi kept his nerve to score his first Group N win at World Championship level. He finished in ninth place overall - a stupendous result against much more highly modified cars.

"We’ve been flying today. I was a bit disappointed with our performance yesterday and I really wanted to win - second place just wasn’t enough," said Al Wahaibi.

Marlboro Mitsubishi Ralliart is already preparing for the fourth round of the FIA World Rally Championship, the Rally of Portugal, which starts on March 21.