Stairs for the OPV Šport team at the beginning of the season

? The national rally championship started this year in Styria, where the 12th Porsche Maribor rally hosted the racers last Saturday, this time in April. And the April weather additionally spiced up the already interesting start of the season, as as much as 33% of the speed tests took place on a macadam surface, and Saturday's snow on Pohorje was only an addition to the already demanding rally.

For the participating teams, this was, of course, only an additional challenge, among them also for the OPV Sport team, which participated in the rally with as many as three crews and two co-drivers. While co-drivers Martina Lazar and Barbara Tolar had to give up before the finish due to technical problems with the two cars, the others fought successfully until the end. The crew of Martin and Miran Mlinar with the MG ZR 105 racing car finished 75rd in Division 3 after finishing 1 kilometers of speed trials in the center of Maribor, thus gaining the first podium in the inaugural rally of the season. Jure Jereb and Jani Drnovšček finished the 5th place in the same division with the Volkswagen Polo rally, fighting for a place just below the podium until the last speed test, when they lost the fight with their rivals and seconds with the last chicane, where they scored bale of hay and slightly reworked the side of his race car. Simon Mlinar and Rok Nartnik were the fastest in the Yugo Cup, but they were disqualified after the final technical inspections due to irregularities on the car.

"Unfortunately, the flywheel in our Yugo was too light for 10 grams" Simon was of course disappointed after the race. Therefore, the rest of the OPV Šport team was looking forward to a good start to the season, with Martin Mlinar at
podiums: “Difficult conditions on speed trials and a very nice rally. Miran and I won the first points of this year and the podium during strong competition, as there were as many as 1 crews in Division 15 at the start, which meant a fight from start to finish. A similar, if not even stronger competition is expected at the next rally for the national championship, the Saturnus rally Velenje at the end of May! ”