The final press conference of the Baja Russia Northern Forest 2010, the second round of FIA International Cup, was held in Igora. Krzystof Holowczyc, Jean-Marc Fortin, Boris Gadasin, Vladimir Demyanenko, Alexander Zheludov, Viktor Volikov, Anatoliy Volikov answered the questions of the journalists.

Question to Krzystof Holowczyc: Could you expect such a result in the kind of event you never participated in?

Krzystof Holowzyc: I think it's always so: when you come to the rally you want to win, it's normal for the sportsmen. Of course understood this is a rally that nobody of drivers from outside Russia has ever win, and we respected this would be not easy. Sure, we made a lot of preparation. The rally was beautiful from the beginning. The snow is fantastic here. We did expect snow conditions but when you see one meter of snow it's unbelievable for the rally. The Swedish rally wants to have some conditions like here. I never drove on stud tyres in a cross-country car, for sure it's the first time. The grip in some places is unbelievable, but in some places it was very slippy and you must find a solution, to find a good tempo, drive without any exaltation, just drive to the end, think about the finish, not about winning some stages. I'm happy to be here, it's a good organization, I think it's one of the best organized rounds of this championship, what to say more? I would like to be here next year.

Question to Krzystof Holowczyc: You come here with the same car you prepared for Dakar this year? What changes you had to make to adapt it for Northern Forest conditions?

Krzystof Holowczyc: First was the heating system, because it's really cold here. An for the restrictor, we needed some one millimeter less, because I'm a FIA seeded driver here, we have less restrictor, it's a regulation.

Jean-Marc Fortin: No, for what I have seen in my career, I can say it was a good stage. The only thing, I believe it better to avoid repeated stages. After several laps the road worns-down badly. It was very hard for transmission. The weather was plus today, and there's a risk every year of such weather.

Question to Alexander Zheludov: Did you expect to find yourself between these two 'monsters' of cross-country?

Alexander Zheludov: I think we drove all the rally quite stably, our times varied from lap to lap just for a few seconds, and may be this is what brought us to the win. I understand that Boris and Krzystof were somewhat faster than we, but for the moment our car is not 100% ready and for the next stage we will be better prepared.

Question to Boris Gadasin: You had technical problems yesterday and today. What happened indeed?

Boris Gadasin: It wasn't a complete surprise, because it's a kind of tradition that we have technical problems on the first long stage. Yesterday the brake disc was damaged, the wheel was blocked and we had to stop, dismantle all this and continue without brakes. Consequently our tasks changed, we had to take the time back, and in such tight conditions unfortunately got a slow puncture, which obviously cost us the win. 25 kilometers to the finish of the stage we lost the tyre and finished on the rim.

Question to Boris Gadasin: Boris, how did the rest cars prepared by your team G-Force Motorsport performed here?

Boris Gadasin: First of all, I would say we are not too much dissapoited with this rally. Although, of course, this is not the result we expected, but both our cars performed well, and could be even faster. What about the car of Bogdan Novitsky, he drove it for the first time but never the less closer to the end of the rally, on the final SS he was faster than Mironenko, which is good result.

Vladimir Demyanenko: Mostly my impressions refer to our car, it was prepared and tested many times, we had strong confidence in its technical condition and capabilities. Regarding the event itself, the impression os mostly the same as usual. The rally keeps being good, hard and interesting. It's a pleasure this year we had an opportunity to fight a lot, thanks to our competitors.образия маршрута.

Question to Viktor Volikov: You participate here in a production class not for the first time. This year there are many changes in the entry list compared to the past. Many favourites did not come. So, in production category, did it become more interesting or dull, clear?

Viktor Volikov: I wouldn't say that the championship lost a lot of participants. It's a pity Konstantin Zhiltsov is not participating this year. However, many new good drivers came in. Alexey Yaskov presented a good fight to the recognized leaders. As usually, the fighting in production class was tight.

Question to Viktor Volikov: Obviously, for prototypes this route is not a hard challenge, but what are the limits of a production car here? The off-road ability of the car, or speed limits?

Viktor Volikov: Of course, driving a production car must be much more cautious here than for a prototype. This year we had new prospects because of the new suspension DONERRE, it gave us additional pace, thanks to Boris Gadasin who advised us this solution. I want to say that year by year we have come to some time limit on this route: we are stably at about 1 hour and 4 minutes. Next year will show if it is a real limit, and then it will be not easy to improve this time.

Question to Anatoliy Volikov: Did you do a lot of pace notes? How do you manage to do at the same time the pace notes, to read a road book and watch the road? Do you really need the road-book of these repeating well known stages?

Anatoliy Volikov: For a production car pace notes are essential. If prototype may pay not much attention to some minor holes or jumps, for us they mean a lot. I think, I recorded at least half of the route. Actually, I had not two but three documents: the road-book, my pace notes, and the last year pace notes.

Question to Krzistof Holowczyc: You have won now the round of the FIA International Cup for Bajas. Are you going to continue in this series this year, or in classic rally?

Krzystof Holowczyc: I don't think we will make all rounds of the FIA Cup. Being here was most for fun, I like these snow conditions. FIA Cup is a very good series, of course, my main aim for the next year is Dakar. And I have a lot of job to do in my country. Apart from the rally, I have three daughters, the youngest of them is two years old, and I have to spend more time with my family. Well, I'm an old guy, it's just great to feel I'm still fast... Next year will be Dakar, and this year may be some classic rallies in my country, Polsky Rally for example, maybe some other single events, but not likely any whole championship... Of course, if my sponsor will push me to the championship I will go, I'm a professional.

Question to Krzystof Holowczyc: What was your special preparation to beat Russians in Russia?

Krzystof Holowczyc: I did not think about beating the Russians, as I understood they know these roads by heart. It's true because they make these stages many times. Our main aim was to be fast enough. And for sure, when you make a pressure for a driver, for example, for Boris, you are waiting for his mistakes – and he makes mistake. It was good for us, and we just kept going, just drive in the normal tempo. If he pushed, we pushed as wel. And we did not have to push on this rally, we just kept going.

Question to Boris Gadasin: Is this rally rather a success or disappointment for you?

Boris Gadasin: If you followed the results, the split times, you probably saw that we were the fastest at all splits, and therefore, of course, we could expect better result. But we could test our cars here, our speed, and I'm not disappointed too much. The good luck is not the least thing in motorsport, and this time Krzistof was more lucky than we.

Question to Boris Gadasin: You took part in the Baja Northern Forest many times, and Krzistof is here for his first time. Don't you think that if he comes again next year, being familiar with the route, he will not leave a chance for anybody else to win?

Boris Gadasin: If you look at the split times, we were the best at the splits on every lap. Krzistof is a very strong driver, it was good to compete with him, but I don't think there will be any problem to fight for a win next year.

Question to Alexander Zheludov: Two stage rally drivers are to be on the podium today. Krzystof already has told us about his plans, and what about you: cross-country or classic rally for this year?

Alexander Zheludov: First I will aim at doing the whole Russian cross-country championship. We will also take part in classic rally if the program is interesting enough. Anyway I wouldn't like to take part in single events, I prefer any championship in whole.

Question to Alexander Zheludov: There were quite a lot ProtechMSport cars here. What are the plans of your team?

Alexander Zheludov: ProtechMSport holds considerably good positions in classic rally and in European autocross. For the moment, we have decided to join forces with Vladimir Frolov and Anton Melnikov and attempt to win the Russian cross-country championship. When recruiting the drivers our team pays attention not how fast they are, but very much to their team spirit. So we aim to achieve the best possible results with these people.

Question to Alexander Zheludov: You competed in autocross, classic rally, cross-country. What else would you like to try?

Alexander Zheludov: Classic rally is still my big love. Cross-country, however, is very interesting for me because I like driving and in cross-country you can make more competitive kilometers in one event.