Samsonas Motorsport together with MV Sport had a busy but successful weekend at the third round of the Lithuanian Rally Championship, where our friend and teammate Emils ‘Big Balls” Blūms tested a Hyundai i20 VRT with Samsonas gearbox and dampers for the first time.
The action began early on Thursday morning when the private test session took place. As the test stage itself did not have many corners, it was enough to understand that for a long time and one of the fastest Mitsubishi Lancer rally drivers in the world – Emils Blūms – it will not take much time to get used to the new car. There were also two very important people who helped Emils understand the intricacies of the completely different car. One of them was Egon Kaur, who has been working with the car since the winter, and one of the best Latvian coaches from the SRT team – Uldis Briedis. After the private test session, everyone was happy and ready to tackle the roads of the Orlen Lietuva Rally.
The rally itself consisted of more than 100 kilometers over two days. Emils was accompanied by his faithful co-driver Didzis Eglītis. The rally was a very good examination as there were dry, damp, and even very wet and muddy stages as the weather conditions played a big role in the stage conditions. Emils, together with Didzis and the Hyundai i20 VRT, managed to have a very even battle with the fastest Lithuanian R5/Rally2 crews and set the fastest time among them in SS9. The unique double wishbone suspension worked incredibly well on the very rough road conditions, which gave Emils an advantage. After 13 special stages, Emils finished 4th overall and third among the R5/Rally2 cars, as first place was taken by a guest from the WRC – Esapekka Lappi.
This result of being very close to the fastest Lithuanian field gives a lot of boost to the team, as MV Sport’s suspension and cars are made for this kind of drivers like Emils – fast national drivers who want to move from old cars like Mitsubishi to the next but affordable level and get the feeling of an R5/Rally2 car with 2-3 less costs.
The next round where we will see MV Sport cars is the Cbet Rally Rokiškis in less than two weeks.
