Duncan has huge lead at halfway mark of race

It is business as usual as Ian Duncan enters ‘home’ in a dramatic fashion by stretching his lead in the 2009 Kenya Airways East African Safari Classic.

With the event into the half-way stage and today being a rest day for the competitors at the world famous Amboseli National Park, Duncan’s lead is the biggest so far since the event started five days ago from Mombasa.

The story of the competition has so far been centred on the battle between the two ex-Safari Rally winners, Duncan and Bjorn Waldegaard, though the latter lost valuable minutes in the first stage yesterday due to a puncture in his Porsche 911.

Overshadowed

The Kenyan has so far overshadowed one of the most famous Safari Rally winners and world rally icons by maintaining his lead from start to the half-way stage of the 10-Marathon event in a Ford Mustang sponsored by Good Year tyres.

“We have done well apart from a few problems. A rest tomorrow (on Friday) will do us good. I must also say our sponsors, Good Year, Sopa Lodges and CMC have done a brilliant job for us to reach this point,’’ said Duncan.

Helicopter pilot Chris Stewart could not hide his admiration for Duncan after flying over his fast-moving Ford Mustang on one of the sections.

“You were going like hell. I just could not keep up with you on the section. You must have been clocking over 170kph. It was impressive,’’ said Stewart.

Gerard Marcy has climbed to sixth place despite having a mixture of fortunes with his Porsche during the course of the day.

Suspension troubles

“We had a puncture in stage two then stopped in stage three thinking we had a puncture or suspension troubles, but found nothing. We were still fastest in that stage,’’ said Marcy.

The surprise pack of the competition so far is Geoff Bell who has preserved an incredible top-five position in one of the most un-fancied cars in the rally.

The South African is rubbing shoulders with some of the top drivers in the competition who have machines that can only be descri bed as ‘bullies’’ over his relatively under-powered Datsun with an engine capacity of up to 1800cc.

His opponents are “showing off” with machines of high performance engines such as those of the Porsches and Datsun 26 0Zs models.