Local hero Maxine Wahome becomes the first woman to win a class in the WRC3 classification at the Safari Rally – despite a retirement on Friday!
28 years after Germany’s Isolde Holderied won the Group N classification at the Sanremo Rally, there was once again a female winner in the World Rally Championship (WRC) at the Safari Rally in Kenya on Sunday. Local hero Maxine Wahome in a Ford Fiesta Rally3 became the first woman to win the WRC3 class.
“I am proud and happy to have made history,” said Wahome after her biggest sporting success to date. The 26-year-old Kenyan, who switched from motocross to rally cars only a year ago, also finished in a good 16th place overall.
Her success was remarkable for several reasons. For one, it was Wahome’s first rally in a Ford Fiesta Rally3, having previously driven a Subaru Impreza in the African Rally Championship.
“It was a big surprise for me. Thursday was my first time in the car,” she says. “My goal was to get to know the car. That worked out better with each day, and so I was able to increase my speed and get first place.”
In addition, a technical defect caused Wahome to retire early on Friday. “We had an ECU problem that kept happening and just before we got into the service it failed again so we had to give up and restart,” the Kenyan reported.
After the restart on Saturday, Wahome produced a clean drive and after one WRC3 starter after another ran into problems, she took the lead in the class, which she drove to the finish on the final day.
“We are happy to have kept first place. The whole mission today was to make it to the finish,” said Wahome. No further starts in the World Rally Championship are currently planned for her. Instead, she will contest the other rounds of the African Rally Championship with the Ford Fiesta Rally3.
