While this year’s FIM Cross-Country Series included the Dakar Rally in Saudi Arabia and additional rounds in Abu Dhabi, Morocco and Spain, the 2022 FIM Bajas World Cup will be held over eight shorter three-day Bajas.
This season’s calendar began in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and moved on to Qatar, Portugal, Spain, Hungary and Portugal before returning to the Middle East for this weekend’s seventh round in hail and the season finale in Dubai in early December. Two planned late summer events in Chile have been cancelled.
This year’s FIM Bajas World Cup will therefore be held over seven events with a coefficient of one and the final in Dubai which will offer a coefficient of two.
The Dubai final is open to all competitors, but to have a chance of placing in the FIM Bajas World Cup classification, competitors must have completed and scored points in one of the previous events. The final classification will be determined based on the top two results of the series in addition to the points awarded in Dubai.
This applies to the motorcycle, quad and SSV categories as well as the junior, ladies and veteran classes.
Motorcycles up to 450cc (single or twin cylinder, 2T or 4T) are eligible for the FIM Bajas World Cup alongside quads and SSVs. Riders of motorcycles over 450cc can participate but will not be allowed to earn points for the Cup as per 2022 regulations.
Therefore, this weekend, the Saudi Baja offers motorcycle and quad riders the last opportunity to earn FIA Baja World Cup points and qualify for the finals in Dubai.
In 2007, Hail hosted Saudi Arabia’s first-ever international motorsport event. The Hail International Rally was added to the FIA calendar this year as a candidate event, having been run as a smaller club status event in 2006.
The hailstorm has been a fixture on the FIA calendar ever since, and in 2013 officials allowed motorcycles and quads to compete for the first time ) won the national motorcycle and quad categories for the first time.
Tomorrow (Wednesday) drivers and riders will pass their administrative and technical checks at Hail before the official pre-event press conference takes center stage from 7pm.
