Jacob Smith fastest in prologue

The stage has been set for an exciting seven days of racing in the 2011 Australasian Safari after the prologue was held in Geraldton on September 23.

After 19km of slipping and sliding through long grass, which also made navigation a challenging affair, 2009 winner Jacob Smith (Honda CRF450X) was the fastest moto competitor, completing the prologue nine seconds ahead of last year’s winner Ben Grabham (KTM 450SXF).

In a typically tight prologue, just 21 seconds separated the top six riders – but three-time Dakar champion Cyril Despres (KTM 450RR) wasn’t one of them.

Despres finished in eighth, as he continues to familiarize himself to the local conditions.

“I caught the dust off other riders with only one minute between each rider starting,” said Despres. “And the navigation is a bit different to what I am used to so it will take me a couple of days to sort this out. But we have a lot of days ahead.”

The rest of the Safari top brass made it through the prologue unscathed, including Todd Smith (CRF450X), Troy O’Connor (KTM 530EXC), Shane Diener (Yamaha WR450F), Damien Grabham (Husaberg FE570), Matthew Fish (505SXF) and Rod Faggotter (WR450F), while young English rider Sam Sunderland (FE570) cartwheeled off his bike at high speed when his handlebars locked.

In the auto division, despite rolling his Holden Colorado Paul Weel with father Kees in the navigator’s seat managed to still finish fastest, 26 seconds ahead of Tony Quinn/Toni Feaver (Mitsubishi Pajero) and Steve Riley/John Doble (Pajero).

Craig Lowndes/John Panozzo (Colorado) finished seventh in the field of 15 cars, but Lowndes said he was happy to not be starting out in No. 1 position for the first leg of the race.

“I took a couple of wrong turns, the grass was almost head high so made navigation tricky, but I’m glad we’re not out first, and the race hasn’t really started yet,” said Lowndes.

2009 Safari winner Riley hoped the fields of purple Patterson’s Curse flowers would not be an omen for the New South Wales farmer.

“It’s a traditional curse for Australian farmers, let’s hope it’s not mine,” Riley said.

Paul Smith (Honda TRX700XX) was ahead of the quad pack in the prologue, 54 seconds ahead of Heath Young (KTM XC Rallye).

All 45 moto, six quad and 15 auto competitors will start leg one on September 24, which will include 328km of competitive stages between Geraldton and Mt Magnet. The route will include extremes of fast and flowing to rough and rocky tracks, with recent rains creating severe erosion.