NAIROBI, Africa: Massimo Biasion of Italy, with co drives Tiziando Siviero, steered his Lancia Integral to victory in the Safari rally here. It was Lancia’s fourth success in as many rallies since the start of the world championship season.
Biasion finished with a total penalty time of 2:51:4 sec, to come home 12 min 53 sec ahead of Kenya’s Mike Kirkland, ina Nissan. Kirkland’s Swedish teammate Per Eklund was third, 44min 22sec behind Biasion.
It was also Biasion’s second successive victory in a world championship event, following his success last month in the Portuguese rally and lifts him to the top of the drivers’ standings ahead ‘of teammate and fellow Italian Alessandro Florio.
Biasion led early in the rally, but ran into difficulties on the second stage, when he had to change a Turbo, but that was the only problem the new Integral provided, and he clawed his way back through the field and regained the lead on Saturday, a position he never relinquished.
His victory underlined that the integral is the perfect all-purpose rally car, while the Nissans displayed remarkable reliability over the most difficult rally route in the world. The big losers were the Toyota team, who experienced a string of problems, despite starting as favorites due to durable reputation of the Supra cars.
Article extracted from this publication >> April 22, 1988
