Baja Russia 2020: Brazilian Reinaldo Varela starts title defense with sixth place in Russia

Brazilian faced car breakdown in a difficult rally in the snow of Leningrad

The Brazilian duo Reinaldo Varela / Youssef Haddad finished sixth in Baja Russia - Northern Forest 2020, the first round of the 2020 FIA Cross-Country Baja World Cup, held in the snowy region of Leningrad, Russia. The result marked the first step towards the defense of the T3 world title (UTVs) won by Varela and his navigator Gustavo Gugelmin in 2019.

“We had a mechanical failure in our car on the first day, which made us lose a lot of time. And on the last day, the car did not have good handling, and this behavior hindered us a lot during the whole race. So our goal was to try to reach the end and score as many points as possible ”, said Reinaldo Varela, who raced at this event after the special invitation made by the G-Force team.

Back to the desert - The next race will have an extremely different scenario. The Dubai International Baja, will be held in the middle of the UAE desert. In 2019, Varela and Gugelmin finished this race in second place and started with this result their campaign for the unprecedented third world championship.

 “Driving in the snow, as in Russia, is a delight. But the dunes are more our element. I think we can fight there again for a good result ”, 

adds Reinaldo who, with Gugelmin, won victories in 2019 in the stages of Qatar, Morocco, and Kazakhstan.

Baja Russia 2020 was won by the local team Fedor Vorobyev and Kirill Shubin

Rally-Raid Network
Source Reinaldo Varela official press release