On April 24-28, the 15th anniversary bach "Kagan's Gold" was held in the Astrakhan region. Gazprom Dobycha Astrakhan LLC became the General Partner for the 14th time. The race, which had three status of the Russian championship in off-road competitions, was attended by 32 crews in car racing and 14 representatives of motorcycle classes.
The grand opening took place on the Volga River embankment. The start of the competition was given by the governor of Astrakhan region Igor Babushkin. In four days, the participants covered a highway with a total length of more than 1,300 km, of which about 780 km were high-speed sections laid across the steppe and sands of the Narimanovsky district.
As part of the first stage of the Russian Truck Rally Championship, for the 13th time, a unique sports KAMAZ using natural gas as a motor fuel entered the track of one of the most difficult races of the season. According to Sergey Kupriyanov, the truck's pilot and Deputy Chairman of the Board and Head of Gazprom's Department, the car that won the Silk Road Rally in 2025 performed well in the steppes and sands of the Astrakhan region.
"The Astrakhan highway is always unpredictable and difficult. It's hard for both the car and the crew. The gas consumption is simply insane on such a viscous ground, so we almost completely burned out the gas supply at each special stage, but there were no problems. We walked the entire route without any blots, the car worked perfectly. Once again, we have confirmed that gas is our everything," Sergey Kupriyanov said.
In the general classification, the crew of the gas KAMAZ showed the eighth time among 32 crews and took sixth place in the T5 (trucks) standings.
The first place at the end of the four-day race was taken by the crew of the KAMAZ-master team Dmitry Sotnikov, Sergey Krenev and Almaz Akhmetzyanov. The second time and the silver prize went to another crew of the Blue Armada, Bogdan Karimov, Dmitry Nikitin and Ilnur Davletshin. The third place was taken by the riders of the MAZ SPORTauto team Sergey Vyazovich, Pavel Garanin and Andrey Kragelsky.
The award ceremony took place on the banks of the Volga River, in the historical district of Astrakhan. In addition to the traditional prizes in the form of a nomad rider, the winners received the famous knitted scarves with race symbols. In the award final, Dmitry Sotnikov's crew was awarded a personal prize, as the fastest on the bach, "Kagan Gold — 2026".
Gazprom Dobycha Astrakhan LLC has been helping to organize the competition since 2012, and since 2023 it has also been helping to hold the Baha Astrakhan Rally Cup of Russia.
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