A trophy promoted by Mazda and the oil company Total, the Mazda Total Challenge reached its tenth edition in 2017. Dedicating, precisely at the 24 Hours of Frontier, the last race of the season, Pedro Dias da Silva and José Janela, pilot and navigator of the PRKSport team. Where, by the way, the Japanese car brand announced the continuation of the trophy in 2018, albeit in slightly different molds. Namely, with Border reduced to just “four or five hours”.
In a ceremony that served not only as a farewell to the season that is now ending, with the natural consecration of the new champions, but also as promises for the new season to come, José Santos, head of the Mazda Total Challenge, announced that the trophy will be held again in 2018. “Although in a slightly different format”.
“Despite the party that Fronteira is, the truth is that this is an expensive race, in which the cars are subjected to intense wear and tear, and it made sense when we ran with the pick-ups. But that hasn't done since we adopted the CX-5 bodywork. As such, this will be the last year we will see Mazda Challenge cars make the full 24 Hours of Frontier. Since, at least for the next year, our idea is to participate, albeit in slightly different ways. That is, doing just four or five hours of testing. Twenty-four hours in the race is definitely not going to be,” says José Santos.
On the other hand, on the horizon is also “the possibility of participating in more competitions of the Nacional de Al-O-Terrain”. With the certainty, from now on, that “we will do at least four tests. The pilots who so wish can do more, five or six”.
As a matter of fact, regarding the number of participants, the director of Post-Sales and Network Development defended that "we want to have, in the next year, more pilots to participate, than the 10 we had this year". There is a guarantee that "we will keep the global value of the prize at 50 thousand euros", even though the final regulation for next year can only be announced in late January, beginning of February, after approval by the FPAK. Which, it should be noted, was also present at the event in the middle of the Mazda tent, at the 24 Hours of Frontier.
Mazda Total Challenge: Champion promises to return for the year
Already virtual champion, the PRKSport pilot, Pedro Dias da Silva, could not help but take stock of the season that is now ending, acknowledging that “it went very well. We had a new car, we had four races, of which we won three. In the fourth, we were forced to give up at a time when we were leading and we were one of the fastest”.
As for the next season and despite the changes now announced, Dias da Silva guarantees that, “if José Janela is available and wants to accept the challenge, we'll be here again. Not only for the Mazda Challenge, but, if possible, all the National Championship events. Also because, this season, we were also the fastest quarters, ex-aequo with third parties, in the T1 category.”
For the rest, and regarding the prototype with CX-5 bodywork, “it is very good, very competitive, especially from Portalegre onwards. So we're just going to make some surgical changes due to the new World Cup regulations. Namely, in weight and suspension, in order to make it even more competitive.”
The promise remains: the champion will return…