ESTEVE WINS IN PATAGONIA RALLY
15 March 2005 - KTM-Sportmotorcycles AG

KTM factory rider Isidre Esteve has won the Patagonia rally this weekend. Esteve lead home fellow KTM riders Marc Coma and Carlo De Gavardo.

After day five of the first round of the Rally Worldcup 2005, the new course of the Por las Pampas/Patagonia-Atacama rally ended uccessfully in San Pedro de Atacama/Chile.

The overall victory took spanish KTM factory supported rider Isidre Esteve, beating team mate Marc Coma after 17h43min timed special tests by only 3 seconds.

Local hero from Chile, Acerbis gear rider Carlo de Gavardo, took 3rd position on the podium. He finished only seven minutes behind the winner despite he was racing with a KTM 450 cc rally engine, competing with the over 700 cc bikes of his team mates.

The very technical and difficult track, which took the riders from Bariloche, south Patagonia up to the Atacama desert, the most arid zone of the world, was timed on 1.486 hard special test kilometres.

Spanish Nani Roma finished 4th with his Mitsubishi in the car category. Prominent race support: Franco Acerbis, big supporter of cross country rallies and friend of the de Gavardo family, followed the rally himself together with Carlo’s father in the Acerbis assistance car, to support the most successful South American offroad pilot.

Overall Classification:
1) Isidre Esteve (KTM) - 17h43min55
2) Marc Coma (KTM) - a 3 segundos
3) Carlo De Gavardo (KTM) - a 7min12
4) Francisco Lopez (Honda) - a 1h48min14
5) Jacek Czachor (KTM) - a 2h14min04

(Source: www.mxlarge.com)

www.ktm.com

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