The Silk Way Rally (Russian: Шёлковый путь) is an annual rally raid held in Russia and neighbouring countries. The first Silk Way Rally was run in 2009 from Kazan, Russia, to Ashgabat, Turkmenistan. It is organised by the Silk Way Rally Association.
The race is part of the Russian Rally-Raid Championship. From 2009 to 2011, it was on the ASO's Dakar Series, followed by being a FIA World Cup for Cross-Country Rallies round.
Silk Way Rally is a rally raid that goes both through off-road spaces and by public roads. Each crew, which usually consists of a driver and a navigator (with a mechanic for truck crews and only of a rider for motorcycles), must complete the Selective Sections (also called Special Stages) of the itinerary indicated in the Road Book (the legend) and pass through all compulsory Waypoints. The crew with the shortest total time on all specials of rally route becomes the winner.
Road sections (or liaisons) between the specials go on public roads and highways and must be covered within the target time, observing Road Traffic Code. The failure to respect the target time incurs a penalty, which is marked on the control card (carnet) and is taken in account during the calculation of total results.
Since 2012 any competitor that fails to complete a special stage is allowed to continue the race with a penalty of 50 hours, added to the total time. This option can be used only one time and must be performed on the next day after the failed stage.
The rally compete in three categories: moto, cars and trucks. The motorcycle class was added in 2019.[1] Along with the division into basic categories of moto, cars and trucks, each of them having its own overall classification, all vehicles that participate in Silk Way Rally are split into separate competition groups as required by FIA.
Edition 1 of the Silk Way Rally set off from Kazan in Tatarstan and headed to Ashgabat in Turkmenistan. The nine days, 4,500-km rally featured 3,900 km of special stages. Carlos Sainz won his 1st international Rally-Raid. A perfect rehearsal for "El Matador" who the following January won the Dakar Rally in his 4th attempt. In the truck category, Kamaz dominated with two-time Dakar winner Firdaus Kabirov taking top honours in what was his last major international victory.
First departure from Moscow for the Silk Way Rally, which saw its number of entries rise, to the delight of the thousands of Muscovites who came to Red Square for the ceremonial start. Ahead of the competitors, seven days of racing and 3,983 km, with 2,366 km of special stages. After the week of hard-fought action it was Poland's Krzysztof Holowczyc scoring the biggest win of his career, ahead of the disciplines greatest driver, Stéphane Peterhansel, while in the truck category, Alès Loprais got revenge from the previous year.
The start once again from Red Square for the Silk Way Rally, which the number of entries is on the rise. On the programme, a completely new 4,000-km route to Sochi. Storms that battered southern Russian forced the race to stop at Gelendzhik. Boris Gadasin became the first Russian driver to win in the car category, while Kamaz returned to its winning ways thanks to another of its young hopefuls, Ayrat Mardeev, the future winner of the 2015 Dakar!
For the Silk Way Rally of year 2017 the Organization Committee prepared a new route project, which includes the best features of the 6th edition as well as some developments and surprises. The rally once again took the form of a marathon through Russia, Kazakhstan and China, which proved itself successful last year. The rally's organisation was commended by the Russian President Vladimir Putin.[citation needed]
• The distance of the route of the Silk Way Rally 2018 (Russian part) - 5169 km, 3127 are special stages
• 94 crews took part
• Permanently accredited media - 214
• TV channels - 85
• 196 broadcast countries
• 3,500 people took rally bivouacs daily
• Up to 20,000 people were in spectator areas daily
• 13 aircraft of aviation support (6 aircraft, 7 helicopters)
On 6 July 2019 the Rally officially took off from Irkutsk.
The 2020 Silk Way Rally was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[5]
The 2021 Silk Way Rally was held but the Mongolian portion was cancelled due to COVID-19 and bubonic plague outbreaks in the country.[6]
The 2022 race was held in July solely in Russia and had limited overseas entrants due to sanctions imposed on the country relating to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Luc Alphand, who was appointed SWR sports director in 2021, departed his post following the invasion.[7]
Like in 2022, the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War meant foreign participants were limited to those from nearby and friendly countries like Belarus, China, and Turkmenistan.[8]
The race returned to a multinational event in 2024 with the return of Mongolia. China was originally included on the route as the final stretch, concluding in Khorgos, but was dropped as the region wanted to wait until it returned to pre-COVID-19 economic activity.[9][10]
In March, the Silk Way Rally Association partnered with Turkmenistan's sport committee to organise a rally raid in the country in September.[11]
The Silk Way Rally has been described by Western investigative journalists as a front for the GRU to help push Russia's geopolitical agenda.[12]
In 2023, a joint investigation between Bellingcat, Der Spiegel, Le Monde, and The Insider uncovered internal Silk Way Rally Association documents that expressed plans to use the race to push Russian soft power in Eurasia. This was to culminate in a large route for the 2022 race that ran from Doha, Qatar, to Damascus, Syria, while also passing major cities in countries like Afghanistan, China, and Turkey.[12] The association's director Bulat Yanborisov was also exposed as a GRU agent who frequently communicated with members of GRU Unit 29155 and received medals from agency head Vladimir Alekseyev.[13][7] Yanborisov denied his connections to the GRU but acknowledged the rally has diplomatic importance.[12]
Various GRU agents have been found to be working with the SWRA to faciltiate movement between countries, with Yanborisov housing its personnel in his estates across Europe.[12] A 2024 investigation by Der Spiegel, The Insider, and 60 Minutes into Unit 29155's ties to Havana syndrome noted Alexander Mishkin, who was involved in the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, disguised himself as a mechanic to travel to China with the 2016 and 2017 rallies.[14]
In June 2024, the United States Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on the Silk Way Rally Association, Yanborisov, and his son Amir. The department described the association as a "Russian intelligence procurement network" that utilised the race's "logistical infrastructure to procure anti-UAV and radioelectronic warfare equipment for use on the battlefield in Ukraine."[15]