I have never seen snow before. Nor have I ever missed the sight of soil and grass until now. I’ve also not engaged with a world without pedestrians… some of the little things we take for granted.
All you see here is a blanket of white snow, the sort of mirage our lying. “white as snow” politicians embrace to run away from guilt.
Snow is bad, and unforgiving on anything living or dead. Just like when I left my shoes outside, only to find them covered in snow which hardened into ice. There is also the world of professional rallying, the opposite of what is practiced in Kenya.
McRae Kimathi and Mwangi Kioni — here for pre-Rally Sweden training — call it “an eye opener”, a wake-up call in styling up because they have “crossed the Rubicon River.”
A team of professionals will service their car during next week’s WRC Sweden.
To show the seriousness of this Junior World Rally Championship (WRC) campaign, M-Sport Poland convinced Priority One WRC driver Craig Breen to fine-tune the Kenyan lads here on how to control a car.
“It does what you tell it. Just relax and follow your instincts,” he told Kimathi after doing several warm up laps.
Sure enough, this professional commands several tens of millions of US dollars in annual salary is magnanimous in kindness and skills. He admitted that he was only doing 50 percent, but his speeds left of trail of snow dust, ripping a rear bumper. This caused goose pimples to young Kimathi.
“Manze, I have never been driven this fast. The guy is breaking on time, down-shifting before pushing the pedal down in full gear at exit point,” said the Africa R3 champion. “He is doing all these communicating to me as if we are on a leisure ride.”
Kimathi had spins on day one. On Friday, he was getting better. “We have told him to avoid hitting snow banks, and should that happen he must switch on wipers and keep on driving to avoid getting bogged down or he has to shovel the ice out alone in the forests,” said instructor John Haugland.
“He can’t learn tricks of ice driving in two days. But he is getting better.
Nutritional food portions
I may have been converted to think like a rally professional in matters stomach.
We are being fed with sandwiches (cheese and veggie) and one serving of thick soup mixed with two small pieces of meat and cheese served in a small cup.
Rally drivers eat small but nutritional food portions, and not hard stuff like ugali and choma which drains and fatigues the body with indigestion, a habit prevalent in Kenya.
There is no tumbukiza and kafirifiri kwa umbali, or alcohol lifestyle for a rally driver until end of season.
Julie Haugland, like all English ladies of her generation, has been so generous in the kitchen. She has read my mood after I boycotted bread and vegetables.
She laid a proper lunch of reindeer meat burgers and sausages mixed with onions, tomatoes and cabbage. Kafirifiri was the only ingredient missing.
This conversation and approach reminded me of two incidents of two Kikuyu “cowboy rally drivers” because there is a lot of casualness back home towards the sport
They will remain nameless.
In the first instance, these two gentlemen stopped at many shopping centres to sample meat ranging from choma, wet fry, matumbo choma and boilo on their way to a Kenya National Rally Championship round in Eldoret. They burnt these down with a ka-quarter Viceroy.
They were so fatigued during the rally itself that the driver did not hear instructions of triple caution as he took a jump in full speed.
They crashed into a culvert, landing on the left side. The navigator didn’t know how the driver came out of the car. But through instincts, he remembers him urging him out “Ndume naihenya na mabuku nii marathie na rui (Get out fast. The pace notes are being washed away by the river).
The others ended in a swamp in Uganda.
For inexplicable reasons, the driver was out first, urging his friend to get out fast or drown since he didn’t know how to swim.
What a better way to conclude tour of duty as Winter Break heads to Umea, Sweden, on Saturday for more training and recce ahead of WRC Rally Sweden.
WRC Promoter top executive Simon Larkin arrived here Friday to give the Kenyans moral support and observe their progression ahead of WRC Sweden, noting that their presence will rekindle rally interest amongst young people.
He was later driven around the circuit to have a feel of the snowy conditions.
He believes rallying in Kenya is facing a renaissance which good for everybody.
The Germany-based WRC Promoter is the marketing arm of the World Rally Championship.
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