Participants of the international 2010 Silk Way truck and 4x4 rally raid completed the race on Saturday evening in the Russian 2014 Olympic host city of Sochi.
The 4,813-km (2,991-mile) rally race began on September 11 in Russia's second largest city of St. Petersburg. The contestants were to drive through eight legs in the Volga Delta, the Kalmykian desert and the Caucasus mountains, with some stages as long as 700 km. A total of 48 cars and 16 trucks took part.
The Kamaz Master crew of Vladimir Rybakov, Vladislav Mizyukayev and Eduard Nikolayev sensationally claimed the first place in the truck category, leaving behind their more experienced teammates, including six-time Dakar winner Vladimir Chagin.
"We did not enter into competition with anyone. We just followed our more experienced colleagues. It so happened that we got a little bit of luck," Eduard Nikolayev said.
Crews led by Chagin and another Dakar participant, Firdaus Kabirov, finished second and third, respectively.
The 4x4 category was won by the favorites, Carlos Sainz and Lucas Cruz of Spain, racing for Volkswagen.
"The Silk Way Rally was a real acid test for the Dakar Rally and a successful one at that," motorsport.com quoted Sainz as saying. "We can take a lot of positive things home from Russia."
"Our aim was to gain as much experience as possible with the new Race Touareg 3 and its new components. The route with the long special stages with difficult dune passages and hot days was virtually tailor-made for this purpose." he added.
Sainz and Cruz now have four victories in four runs on their track record. The all-Spanish duo has been running together since the 2009 Rallye dos Sertoes (Brazil), which they won. They also claimed victory in the Silk Way Rally in 2009 (Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan) as well as in the 2010 Dakar Rally in Argentina and Chile.
Their team colleagues Nasser Al-Attiyah/Timo Gottschalk and Mark Miller/Ralph Pitchford came second and third, respectively.
The winning crews will receive $10,000. Those who came second and third will get the cash prizes of $8,000 and 6,000, respectively.
SOCHI, September 19 (RIA Novosti)
