Summarize

Despite a tough, challenging and bitterly cold opening event to the 2025 South African Rally-Raid series in Bronkhorspruit over the weekend, Red-Lined Motorsport managed to come home with a mixed bag of results. Young guns Jayden Els and Johann Swemmer continued to show great pace in the factory REVO T1+ GTR by setting the second quickest time during Friday’s qualifying stage. Several of their team mates went on to collect three podium results, while Johan de Bruyn and Adriaan Roets emerged as the inaugural winners of the VAPS HCV Red-Lined T1 Cup.

“Bronkhorstspruit proved a really challenging and difficult weekend,” Red-Lined team principal Terence Marsh pointed out. “It was rather frustrating because our top gun young crew Jayden and Johann showed so much promise early on.” Els and Swemmer opted to open the road for Friday afternoon’s first stage in their factory REVO T1+ GTR which came to an abrupt end when they hit a ditch at pace and broke a steering arm which effectively put them out of the overall running. The car was repaired overnight which allowed them to go on and finish the event but not before breaking a driveshaft during the final stage and having to cruise home in two-wheel drive.

Danie Ludick and Denzil Williamson showed good pace early on in their new Elegant Fuels REVO T1+ V8 before landing heavily on the front end of their race car after mistiming a big jump. That damaged their power steering, which slowed them significantly until the technical team could make repairs between Saturday’s final stages. They eventually fought back to finish an impressive third overall in the new SA T1+ class and continue their 100% finishing record since 2023. 

Red-Lined-built cars however utterly dominated in the T1 Adventure class. “Johan de Bruyn and Adriaan Roets need to be congratulated on winning the inaugural round of our prestigious new VAPS HCV Red-Lined T1 Cup in their Falken Tyres REVO T1,” Terence Marsh explained. They went on to finish second overall within the national T1 championship class while Nickus Heinlein and Jaco Kriel brought their Sirkel N VK50 home third overall to record their first national podium on debut.

Besides getting stuck in a big mud hole and losing loads of time together with other competitors, the Belgian duo Vincent Vroninks and Dave Berghmans fought back to eventually finish fourth in the T1 class on what was a steady South African debut in their Red-Lined VK56. Unfortunately, that same dreaded mud hole led to the demise of the current South African T1 champions Gerhard and Rudi Heinlein in their Sirkel N VK56 as their eventual recovery made it impossible for them to make the time bar.

Dutch duo of Rients Hofstra and Evert Boersma continued with the development program of the all new REVO GTR drivetrain and steering rack set up with much needed mileage and learnings coming out of the event.

“All in all, a challenging event while at the same time there were lots of learnings so we will now need to regroup and come back stronger for Stonehenge Lodge event in Parys on 15 and 16 August,” Terence Marsh concluded. “Overall, a big team effort in what was really rough and challenging conditions, well done to all!“