" The Safari Rally has ever been a great challenge just for the best to cope with, and I have to pronounce that I am very proud of being there when the success was born."
Jiri Kotek and Juergen Bertl - Car No 45
 

The beginning dates back to the times when Mike Kirkland as well as other chief organizers of East African Safari Rally themselves acted as the participants of then world competitions, and we all used to meet each other, performing various kinds of jobs.

My life has ever been linked just with one brand and I perceived Safari Rally to be the world toughest challenge. I could hardly expect taking part in it, letting alone any exceptional achievement with a Skoda car.

Therefore, when I had been given the opportunity to try the reality of East African Safari Rally 2003 on my own, I didn’t hesitate a second to be there.

The main agent, Skoda 1100 MB, manufactured in 1968, has already taken part in the London-Sydney Marathon (1993 and 2000), the London-Mexico Rally (1995) and the Panama-Alaska Rally (1997). When making the decision to go, the car had already been one of the exhibits in the museum of rally cars in Daventry and part of the collection of Ana Goni and David Sutton. Those were just them who first came up with an idea to put the car through such a hard test. There was no other answer than “yes” to that kind of challenge for a proud Skoda devotee, regardless I was having no idea what all could happen.

My experience with the same car, gained at previous long distant competitions and five years on the position of a team manager at Safari Rally, helped me to get ready thoroughly and identify potential weaknesses. It was true that Skoda has never taken part in such a strenuous race before. All preparations and logistics were made on a nonprofessional basis; this gave the promise of a big adventure with a very uncertain result.

Robin Boyd-Moss from Nairobi, a local insider due to his past starts at Safari Rally with Ford Escort, should have been my partner. Unfortunately, his business problems caused that he had to give this event finally up. Thus, two weeks before the start I had no idea who would sit down next to me on the 10th of December. The situation about the car was not better either. The ship arrival, scheduled to Mombassa on November 27, was constantly put off and our start was endangered.

“A friend in need is a friend indeed” – this saying came true when Juergen Bertl appeared. He was the right man on the spot with long-standing experience, gained through his twenty participations in this race. Just thanks to him I became familiar with Safari Rally in the past and we both were very lucky meeting each other on the very last moment along with one car. After crossing the start ramp nine days of collective concentration only on the best possible achievement begun. There were no obstacles impossible to pass over; we were driven ahead just by the vision of goal. Nine days of immediate problem solutions, when the accompanied service teemed with enthusiasm but on the other hand, was missing essential experience and, sometimes equipment required, as well. All these only run up our big adventure.

Now, when looking back at Safari Rally, I feel much more optimistic about Skoda because so far best result on the World Rally Championship, the third position of Armin Schwarz with Octavia WRC in 2001, as well as our class primacy and excellent 18th position overall in competition with Ford Escorts or Porsche 911 are more than persuasive.

The Safari Rally has ever been a great challenge just for the best to cope with, and I have to pronounce that I am very proud of being there when the success was born. Of course, it was not only my credit, and, I would like to thank all who helped me this way. My apologies to the unmentioned but I would like to thank at least Ana Goni, David Sutton, Vladimir Sulc, Vratislav Kulhanek, Chris Mack, Robin Boyd-Moss, Aakif Virani, Juergen Bertl, and the whole team of Mike Kirkland for such a perfect race.


Jiri Kotek and Juergen Bertl -

Car No 45