Silva set the third quickest time on the opening Qualifying stage and won three of the subsequent four selective sections across rural terrain in the Argos Orestiko region of western Macedonia to confirm the win.

The Portuguese said: “We are very proud to finish in first place in this rally. It is our first victory in an FIA event and we worked hard for a few years to get to this day. Our team builds our own cars and we started a few years ago. This is the third event that we have done in these cars.”

Fellow countrymen, Pedro Dias de Silva and Victor Jesus, finished as runners-up and second in the T1 section in their PRK Sport Rally Team Volkswagen Amarok and Alexandre and Rui Franco rounded off the podium places in a second Mercedes and gave Portugal a clean sweep of the top three positions in the general classification.

Poland’s Michal Maluszyński teamed up with Lukasz Kurzeja in an X-raid-built Mini John Cooper Works Rally to finish fourth and maintain an unofficial single point lead in the Drivers’ Championship after two rounds.

Santiago Navarro and Marc Sola extended their advantage in the FIA T3 Championship to 31 points with a comfortable class victory in their FN Speed Team Can-Am Maverick. The Spaniard finished fifth overall and 23min 54.5sec clear of the Portuguese category runner-up Filipe Nascimiento. Fellow Spaniard Ricardo Ramilo came home third in T3.

Amerigo Ventura and Mirko Brun came out on top in the FIA T4 category and strengthened their bid for overall championship honours. The Italian guided his Quaddy Racing Yamaha YXZ 1000 R to a late win over Polish title rival Tomasz Bialkowski. The duo finished sixth and seventh in the general classification, although the Pole continues to lead the T4 championship by the narrowest of margins in his Polaris.

Ventura said: “It’s an amazing feeling to be at the top of the podium in the T4 category. We were second until today and we pushed a lot in the last two stages. The stages were really rough but we are happy with the result.”

Lithuania’s Egidijus Valeisa and Spaniard Miguel Angel Valero were classified in eighth and ninth overall and third and fourth in T4 in their Can-Ams. Italy’s Andrea Alfano rounded off the top 10 in a T1 Nissan Pathfinder.

Alessandro Bellini came home in 15th of the 19 finishers to claim maximum points in the FIA T2 category for showroom production vehicles. Fellow Italian and Mitsubishi Pajero driver, Andrea Schiumarini, was second in class but a long way behind his fellow countryman after suffering technical issues.

Portugal’s Edgar Condenso (Ford), Israel’s Gal Shacham (Toyota) and qualifying stage winner Petr Hozak (Hummer) failed to finish the three-day event, which was held in punishing heat and temperatures well over 30°C.

The third round of the 2022 FIA European Cup for Cross-Country Bajas takes place in northern Italy on July 8th-10th.

More information on the event website and FIA European Cup for Cross-Country Bajas page on fia.com.

Photo: H. Silva/H. Damasio, Mercedes Proto 350 (#209), photo: Rally Greece Offroad Facebook

* T1 unless stated