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Team Mitsubishi Ralliart, which receives technical support from Mitsubishi Motors, was crowned champion in the recently-concluded Asia Cross Country Rally (AXCR) 2022 that was held in Thailand and Cambodia.
Thai driver Chayapon Yotha, who drove a Mitsubihi Triton, covered the total distance of 1,524 km in 8 hours, 22 minutes and 42 seconds in winning the championship.
Another Mitsubishi Triton driverRifat Sungkar of Indonesia finished in fifth position with 17 minutes and 14 seconds behind the leader.
The other finishers included: 2) Toyota Hilux’s Jaras Jaengkamolkulchai; 3) Toyota Fortuner’s Ikuo Hanawa; and 4) Toyota Fortuner’s Takuma Aoki.
After a three-year absence, the AXCR got under way in Buriram in the northeastern part of Thailand, where the first SS of the rally and a ceremonial start were held. Leg 1 on the 22nd to Leg 3 on the 24th included SS located in the area around Buriram. Leg 4 on the 25th saw the rally cross the border into Cambodia after finishing the SS around Buriram, while Leg 5 on the 26th ended at the spectacular ceremonial goal near Angkor Wat, the famed tourist attraction in Siem Reap, Cambodia.
The first half of the rally in Thailand consisted mainly of high-speed stages on rough, dry unpaved roads, while the second half was more challenging with large, deep puddles scattered on muddy roads caused by heavy rain, and a tougher course compared to the previous five stages awaited the participants in Cambodia.
Yotha, driving the car #105 Triton, finished fifth in SS1 on the first day. On the second day, he set the fastest time in SS2, the longest SS of this year’s AXCR with a 203 km course, and climbed to the top overall position. After that, the powerful driving performance and nimble handling of the Triton helped him to finish SS3 in seventh, SS4 in sixth, SS5 in fifth, and SS6 in fifth, and he maintained the lead he had established in SS2 to take the overall win.
Hiroshi Masuoka, team director of Team Mitsubishi Ralliart, said: “For this year’s AXCR, we built on the high reliability and durability of the Triton by tuning the engine and chassis, and entered the rally with specifications relatively close to the production car. Even so, the two Triton rally cars delivered powerful driving, and I am very proud of our high finish. The superb performance came down to the drivers, who were able to extract the Triton’s performance and show us some great drives, the engineers who worked every day to fine-tune the vehicles perfectly, all the staff who provided support, and the know-how that Mitsubishi Motors has accumulated over the years. Key to it all was the tremendous support from our sponsors and the passionate messages of support we received from fans around the world. We would like to feed the knowledge we gained through our participation in the AXCR back into the development of production vehicles, and build Mitsubishi vehicles that are even tougher, more powerful, and more reliable.”