DEAD SEA: Abdullah Al Rawahi became the first Omani ever to win the Jordan Rally after a dramatic fightback by Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah was thwarted by punctures on the closing stages of a pulsating Jordan Rally yesterday.
Al Rawahi and local driver Ata Al Hmoud had taken a lead of 2min 33.5sec into the final six special stages in the Dead Sea and Jordan Valley areas in their Škoda Fabia Evo. But Al Attiyah and Mathieu Baumel launched a full-scale fightback during the morning and reduced the deficit to 1min 20sec at the midday service point.
The pendulum appeared to have swung in the Qatari’s favour when the Oman Rally Team crew clocked out of service three minutes late and incurred a 30-second time penalty, reducing the deficit to 50 seconds. But Al Attiyah was forced to change a punctured tyre on the first test after the restart and then punctured again with Al Rawahi reaching the finish 7min 04.2sec clear of the struggling defending champion.
With the pressure off on the final stage, it enabled Al Rawahi to secure his third career MERC win and Al Hmoud became the first Jordanian to win his home rally since Amjad Farrah and Khalid Zakaria prevailed on a dramatic final stage way back in 2004. Al Rawahi’s third success drew him level with the late Björn Waldegård, Jean-Pierre Nasrallah and Abdullah Bakhashab in the regional Hall of Fame.
Al Attiyah said: “This is my favourite race but, this year, it was not easy. Day one and day two, we were struggling a little bit with the problems. Today we had two flat tyres in the same stage and we tried to manage three stages with punctures and we had only one spare. We made it happen. It was important to finish and we finished second. Well done to Abdullah, he did an amazing race. Still, we are leading the championship and we look ahead to Lebanon. I am disappointed at one point but, on the other, I am happy to finish.”
Meshari Al Thefiri teamed up with Qatar’s Nasser Al Kuwari and were the class of the MERC2 field for the third successive event this season. The Kuwaiti rounded off the podium places and finished 6min 49.2sec clear of fourth-placed Jordanian Shaker Jweihan and his Omani co-driver Taha Al Zadjali.
After Sheikh Bader Al Fayez and Emad Juma left the road on the second stage of the morning, that opened the door for Shadi Shaban and Samer Issa to finish fifth. The Lebanese pairing of Ahmad Khaled and Joseph Kmeid rounded off the top six and finished fourth in MERC2. Up-and-coming Jordanian talent Mustafa Al Atari was seventh overall.
Al Attiyah admitted that it would be difficult to claw back the time lost with Friday’s driveshaft issue and co-driver Baumel calculated that they would need to take around 25 seconds on each of the day’s six special stages. It was a tall order indeed but the Qatari started well and beat Al Rahawi by 33.6 seconds in Bahath (12.58km).
That flying opener was just the start Al Attiyah needed and the pressure was firmly on Al Rawahi through Suwayma. The Omani carded a time of 5min 59sec but Al Attiyah trimmed another 19 seconds off the Škoda Fabia driver’s advantage and headed to Ma’in trailing by 1min 41.9sec.
There was no stopping Al Attiyah and he tore through the stage 21.9 seconds quicker than Al Rawahi and headed to the service stop at the Dead Sea trailing by just 1min 20sec with the afternoon loop of three stages to run.
Tyre strategy and tyre wear would be decisive in the afternoon. Al Attiyah had a new set of tyres on the Polo but the story took a dramatic twist when crews left the service park at the Dead Sea. Al Rawahi mistakenly clocked out of service three minutes late and incurred a 30-second penalty. The gap was down to 50 seconds for the final showdown in the sun.
Al Attiyah was now running first on the road but the fight back stalled when the Qatari punctured, changed a tyre in the stage and was 2min 17sec slower than his morning’s run. He haemorrhaged 2min 02.9sec seconds to Al Rawahi and found himself 2min 52.9sec adrift with two stages to run. Was Al Rawahi on the verge of winning the Jordan Rally for the first time?
With only one spare tyre on the car for the loop of stages, a resigned Al Attiyah noticeably eased his pace on the second pass through Suwayma to conserve what rubber he had left and completed the stage 1min 35.5sec behind Al Rawahi. The gap mattered not at this stage – the Omani was 4min 28.4sec ahead and heading for a famous win – but Al Attiyah punctured again and still had to complete the second run through Ma’in.
There were no late dramas and Al Rawahi secured a first ever win in the Hashemite Kingdom by the flattering margin of 7min 04.2sec. Al Attiyah crawled around the final stage and dropped another 3min 34sec to the Omani but he held on to second place by just 1min 33sec.
Action in the 2023 FIA Middle East Rally Championship resumes in Lebanon on September 15-17.
