NWM Ford ahead in the Sertões with the X Rally Team

The third day of Brazil’s Rally dos Sertões represented the end of the marathon stage, where competitors drove flat out for around 550 kilometers in the previous two stages. Now, teams, drivers and co-drivers reached the city of Aruanã after 306 kilometers after leaving Santa Terezinha de Goiás with no team assistance whatsoever.

Current champions and leaders of the TIA FIA cars overall classification, NWM/X Rally Team duo Cristian Baumgart/Beco Andreotti was third this Tuesday after having to do a quick pit stop to change a puncutred right-front tyre. The duo keep the overall lead with a 15-minute gap over Reinaldo Varela/Gustavo Guglemin’s Ford Ranger, the new second-placed duo – the Mini of Sylvio de Barros/Rafael Capoani rolled over in the stage and did not finish the day.

“We lost about two minutes making the change, and we could make up time in the final sector where we had about 100 kilometers of long straights”, said Baumgart, according to whom the NWM-build Ford Ranger V8 44x4 reached its top speed of 185 kph. “It was a matter of bringing the car home for a full maintainance service, and we did it with no losses”, highlights co-driver Andreotti.

For Neil Woolridge and his team, it is time to consolidate the advantage in front. “Until now everyone have done a perfect job. The car had no mechanical problem and the team are working only on minor bodywork damages – since Cristian and Beco had to open five farm gates yesterday. Now we will do a full service, have everythin revised to make sure our machinery is 200% ready for tomorrow. We haven’t even reached the half of the rally, so we have to keep our heads down working towards our main goal”, Neil states.

This Wednesday the Sertões leave the Goiás state to enter Mato Grosso heading to the city of Barra do Garças. The fourth day of competition will be 471-km long with 273 kms on the clock.

Day 3 Results (top-5): Santa Terezinha de Goiás (GO) – Aruanã (GO)
1. 302 Guilherme Spinelli/Youssef Haddad (MINI) – 3h41min58s18
2. 304 Reinaldo Varela/Gustavo Gugelmin (FORD RANGER) – 3h45min15s10
3. 301 Cristian Baumgart/Beco Andreotti (FORD RANGER) – 3h40min54s13
4. 305 Luis Carlos Nassif/Filipe de Oliveira (T-REX) – 3h12min53s57
5. 329 Alvarez Fernando/Juan Monasterolo (AMAROK) – 3h20min05s43

Overall Cars T1 FIA (top-3)
1. 301 Cristian Baumgart/Beco Andreotti (FORD RANGER) – 10h54min04s80
2. 304 Reinaldo Varela/Gustavo Gugelmin (FORD RANGER) – a 14min47s
3. 329 Alvarez Fernando/Juan Monasterolo (AMAROK) – a 41min36s

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