Over the weekend, the first stage of the Perimetras Series Sport took place at the Gaižiūnai training ground in Jonava district, where as many as 39 crews stood at the starting line. Among the participants started CFMOTO Thunder Racing Team racers, who set themselves goals not only to achieve high positions, but also to prepare for the upcoming "Breslau" rally in Poland, where the most capable athletes from Europe gather.
"It was an interesting race - we had a lot of tasks to solve, but that's the only way we learn and keep improving. It was nice that there were a lot of navigational puzzles in the special stages, most of which I managed to solve, but I also got lost a bit. I was satisfied with the speed, and the most important question we were looking answer to in this race was whether the improvements we made to the quads paid off. We found the answer - the equipment is now fit for the race", Antanas Kanopkinas spoke about the competition and quad bikes and said that he will spend the next month preparing for the upcoming start.
Another racing driver Mindaugas Skudutis, who started for the first time with the CFMOTO Thunder Racing Team, said after the finish that he learned a lot during the race kilometers and had to find answers to many unknowns. Although the athlete knows how to drive fast and has proven it many times, this was his first competition with a road book: "There was a lot to learn and a lot to find out. The prologue, for example, was very fast, so sometimes it seemed like there was no time to look at the road book, but everything is fine - I got the third starting position among motorcycles and quads. The other special stages also went well, but there were mistakes both in the road book and I made several navigational mistakes myself."
Despite minor mistakes that happened to both team members, the athletes took the first and second places in the quad classification, and overall, among all 39 participants, A. Kanopkinas took the third place, and M. Skudutis - fourth.
Both athletes agree that while the victory at the Perimetras race is very important, it was also invaluable training for the Breslau rally in a month. A. Kanopkinas says that this race, which took place on the military training ground, is very similar to the upcoming rally: “The Breslau rally takes place on one of the largest military training grounds in Europe, so we had a smaller version of it. The upcoming race will have extremely confusing navigation and possibly very dusty tracks. After a rally in Poland, you usually want to say 'never again', but it doesn't take long for you to miss that challenge again."