Yasin Nasser has claimed his second Uganda National Rally Championship title after a victory at Bam Petroleum Challenge Rally.
The event dubbed Bam Petroleum Rally was fifth round of the Uganda National rally Championship and took place over the weekend.
Home hero Ponsiano Lwakataka took early charge of the rally winning two of four the stages on Saturday and leading leg one by 16.64seconds.
Into day two, Yasin Nasser alongside Ali Katumba came up with a strategy to increase on their pace. The crew managed to dominate day two winning four stages to create a strong lead of 45seconds off Lwakataka before the final stage.
Yasin stumbled in the last stage when his car spun on slippery roads after a downpour. However, is lead was big enough to claim the win.
The Moil rally team triumphed overall with a slight margin of 14.28sec over Lwakataka.
With this victory, Nasser has collected maximum points to seal the 2023 championship with 498points; 248points more than Ronald Sebuguzi who is now second on the standings.
Lwakataka fully charged his Subaru N12 to hunt down the Ford Fiesta R5 but it all went in vain as the gap kept on increasing.
He later gained an advantage in the last stage as it started to drizzle where he recorded a stage win for the day and managed to slice his deficit by 38 sec from Yasin who only maintained a steady run in the slippery Masasi stage.
Ronald Ssebuguzi had a cautious drive throught the day to maintain his third position and it was a mission accomplished for the team.
Muwanguzi Joshua had a smooth run throught the event and he managed to triumph in the category hence gaining more points to extend his championship lead.
Ali Muhammed alongside his brother Anees Muhammed also boosted their hopes for the CRC championship as they yet podiumed in the category for the fourth consecutive time after their debut in Hoima.
Ali Omar “Bobo” alongside Yusuf Babu sealed the CRC podium after the crew managed to maintain a steady drive throught the event.
Ibrahim Lubega later regained the 2WD lead after the leader Mansur Lubega dropped out in the ultimate stage hence crowned victors of the category.
With this win, Pasua is now only eyeing one more podium finish to be ocially crowned champions in the category as his closest rival Oscar Ntambi missed out the event.
Julius Ssemambo “Mukalo” put up an astonishing performance throught the event hence finishing second in the 2WD category.
Relentlessly, Samuel Watendwa along with Monica Birwinyo pushed their Toyota FX to the last FF with only 3 tyres left as they lost their right rear wheel in the ultimate stage after having still had troubles in the penultimate one.
Their eorts later paid o with a well deserved 2WD category podium.
However, a number of crews never managed to start the day as they lacked prospect for a restart.
Among the crews are, Duncan Mubiru who had a number of mechanical issues and time to fix the car was not in his favour.
Stefano Valeri also knocked down the engine in the super special and the situation seemed to be severe as they crew head to service.
Fred Kitaka was also denied a second chance by his Subaru N10 as the car kept on miss firing so he couldn’t restart.
Mustapha Mukasa could also not restart for the day as his car turbo problems couldn’t be fixed.
“Our new turbo that was ordered from town was not fit for us to proceed with the event” said the crew when asked about not restarting.
The next event on the calendar is Burundi ARC rally that is scheduled for this weekend and over 5 Ugandan crews are expected to show up.
