On 27 April, rally “Riga–Carpathians 2019” was started on AB dam. 13 participants in 5 historical cars are on their way from Riga through Lithuania to Carpathians in Poland, Slovakia and Ukraine, with the rally route including Moldova and Belarus in the return ride. Distance of the planned ride exceeds 4,000 kilometers.
Entrepreneurs and representatives of creative professions have started their ride by two LADA 2101 (manufactured in 1979 and 1974), LADA 2106 (manufactured in 1988), GAZ-24 (manufactured in 1974) and Moskvich 412 (manufactured in 1972). Five teams will face various challenges during the nine day ride – from orientation in the mountain roads to searching for night’s lodging and even organisation of a concert with the rally participant and cellist of Melo M Kārlis Auzāns being the starring performer.
Goal of the rally is promotion of international commonwealth, getting acquainted with people of various cultures and obtaining alternative idea about the region included in the route. All adventures of the rally will be later summarized in a documentary.
Author of the idea and organised of the rally for the second year by turn is Jānis Mozga, Chairman of the Board of the logistics company JSC (A/S) SONORA and Head of the Business Cooperation Councils of the Employers’ Confederation of Latvia. J. Mozga: “After the successful and adventure saturated rally “Tashkent–Riga” honoring the 100th anniversary of Latvia last year, we decided the rally should go on. This year, being larger team, we have decided to check, how will these heavily experienced zhiguli, volga and moskvitch cars be able to cope with the mountain roads in Carpathians, followed by the trip to Odessa and, with a moment of visiting Belarus, to return to Riga.
Our previous trip confirmed that we had chosen a great team – not professional drivers, but venturous and adventure devouring participants, who are attracted by difficulties, who want to get acquainted with countries and people from different point of view, to see things that are excluded from tour guides.”
Participants of the rally will be: entrepreneurs from the JSC (AS) “Sonora” – Jānis Mozga, Uldis Batarags, Jurijs Konovalovs and Dmitrijs Koļesņiks, LLC (SIA) “Ošukalns” will be represented by Audris Grīnbergs and Rihards Grīnbergs, “Balcia Insurance” – by Lauris Boss, “E.Tauriņš un partneri” – by Ralfs Kirštuks, “General Holding Latvia” – by Linards Spēlmanis, “Latio” – by Ruslans Vengers, “REF Minerals” – by Raitis Krastiņš, and place in the rally will be taken also by designer Ilvars Elceris and “Melo M” musician and composer Kārlis Auzāns.
Real planning of such a trip is not possible, neither is finding night’s lodging and determining precise route, because, according to the rally participant Raitis Krastiņš – “it is clear that these cars will stop at some point, and the only question is – how long will it take to get then operable again to keep moving”. In technical terms, this year the cars are in much better condition; a year ago, as soon as they were bought in Tashkent, they were driven to Riga right away, however, this time there was some more time for more careful preparation.
“My rally formula is, first of all, team and unity, second, competition and, third, adventure with uncertain end”, tells Dmitrijs Koļesņiks, who has joined the team of the experienced zhiguli car “Sinepīte” [Little mustard]. This year, “Sinepīte” had a special cargo – it will carry the cello of Kārlis Auzāns on the roof to make sure there is enough music during the trip.
The grey zhiguli car “Opītis” [Granddad], which was the first to reach Riga from Tashkent with standing ovations last year, has also commenced the trip, and so has also the black Volga, which is to allegedly assume role of the guide. These three vehicles have been joined by another two, which are to face their first big trip.
The trip is supported by the Embassy of Ukraine in the Republic of Latvia and the Ambassador Oleksandrs Miščenko. Rally cars will be decorated by special design, and flag of Latvia, as well as flags of the countries to be crossed will be attached to the cars.
Every interested person will be able to follow the trip in the social network accounts Rally Riga–Carpathians 2019 – Facebook (@RallyRigaCarpathians2019) and Instagram (#RallyRigaCarpathians2019), where rally diaries will be available, and to follow the actual location of participants in the map.
