According to the rally site DirtFish, a couple of Toyota’s shipping containers won’t be arriving in Mombasa on time. The containers, transporting recce cars and other service park equipment, are delayed.
Competitor teams M-Sport Ford and Hyundai’s containers are already being unloaded at the port of Mombasa and are being swiftly transported to the rally hub in Naivasha. However, Toyota’s containers are scheduled to be unloaded only around Saturday midnight. Subsequently, they must undergo customs inspections, be loaded onto trucks, and then face an eight-hour drive.
Toyota’s rally cars are already at the Naivasha service park, but the major concern revolves around the recce cars, which are supposed to be in action early Monday morning. Nevertheless, there’s strong confidence within the team that everything will be sorted out, albeit it will undoubtedly be a busy time.
“We’re not concerned about this. We’ve been monitoring the situation and working with the organisers. I think the boat is something like five hours delayed, but we’ll be in the service park on Sunday, no worries,” Toyota’s sporting director Kaj Lindström told DirtFish.
If the delay extends, Toyota could rent cars for the recce. However, it’s likely that all equipment will reach Naivasha in time.
“It should be fine coming through customs – the organisers will have people there helping out. But this is something a little bit out of the control of the teams and, like we know and understandably, the teams want to be in full control all of the time,” an insider source from Kenya stated.
Toyota was the only team that brought its longhaul kit to Jyväskylä, Finland, following the last requirement. In contrast, Hyundai and M-Sport transported their equipment directly from last November’s Rally Japan to Kenya.
Safari Rally begins with a shakedown on the upcoming Wednesday. The actual event starts on Thursday with a spectator stage near the capital, Nairobi.
