The inaugural event, the East African Coronation Safari, took place from May 27 to June 1, 1953, in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanganyika. It was renamed the East African Safari Rally in 1960 and became the Safari Rally in 1974. From 1973, the rally was a part of the World Rally Championship.
The 5,000 kilometre route presented competitors with varied terrain, including fesh fesh, fast farm tracks, and rough roads in the Great Rift Valley. The rally was historically one of the fastest events in the world championship, with average speeds exceeding 100 kilometres per hour. However, the roughness of the terrain and the long stages meant that the winner was often the most reliable or the fastest cautious driver. In later years, top rally teams would use helicopters to fly ahead of the cars to warn of animals or other vehicles on the rally route. In the 1990s, Toyota Team Europe established a full-time test team in Kenya to prepare for the event.
In 1996, the Safari Rally adopted the special stage format, and servicing cars from helicopters was prohibited. From 1996 to 2002, the rally featured around 2000 km of timed stages, significantly longer than most other rallies. The event was excluded from the WRC calendar in 2003 due to a lack of finance and organisation.
Following its removal from the WRC, the rally continued as part of the African Rally Championship from 2003. The event was modernised, with shorter stages and running on closed roads, like other events in the World Championship. It also featured as part of the Intercontinental Rally Challenge in 2007 and 2009. A plan to return the Safari Rally to the world championship was announced in 2013 by President of Kenya Uhuru Kenyatta.
The 2020 event was announced as part of the World Rally Championship but was later cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Safari Rally ultimately returned to the WRC in 2021, held in Naivasha, Nakuru County. The event has a contract to remain on the WRC calendar until 2026.
Shekhar Mehta and Carl Tundo are the most successful competitors in the Safari Rally’s history, each with five outright victories. Mehta won in 1973, and consecutively from 1979 to 1982, all while the event was part of the world championship. Tundo’s five wins came when the event was part of the African Rally Championship – in 2004, 2009, 2011, 2012 and 2018. Tundo has also achieved twelve podium finishes, more than any other driver, with Ian Duncan following with nine.
The East African Safari Classic Rally, officially known as the East African Safari Classic Rally, is a classic rally event first held in 2003 to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the first running of the event. The event takes place over 5,000 kilometres and is open to vehicles built before 1985. The 2017 edition of the rally had joint winners, as both Richard Jackson and Carl Tundo had the same time. The 2022 event was originally scheduled for 2021, but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The corpus source is a single Wikipedia article on the Safari Rally. Primary archives, autobiographies, period programmes, and specialist publications were not consulted.
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