Yana Pelenichenko

 

Yana Pelenichenko is one of Kazakhstan’s leading rally drivers. 

The Kazakh rally scene is quite small, and Yana is part of a team aiming to raise its profile. 

She started young, co-driving for her father Mark from the age of fourteen in 2012. Mark Pelenichenko only ever competed at club level due to health problems. Yana then started learning to drive and preparing herself for a career behind the wheel.

Her first rally as a driver, the Rally Stepniye Volki in 2012, resulted in an eighth place. Her car was a Citroen C2, which she has continued to drive since then. The car was bought in Moscow.

In 2013, she managed two fifth places, in the Sapsan and Vostochnyy Marafon rallies, and also travelled to Italy for her first European event, which was the Rally Ronde Prealpi Mastershow. She drove a Subaru Impreza and was 94th. 

She continued to be very competitive in her home country in 2014, still in the C2. She was sixth in the Sapsan and Saryagash Rallies. Unfortunately, she also had quite a few retirements, and was one of three drivers excluded from the Stepniye Volki event.

She does not appear to have competed in 2015, but she came back in 2016, again in a C2. She was eighth in the Rally Sapsan. A repeat of this car and rally pairing in 2017 resulted in a fourth place. 

In 2018, she earned two further fourth places in rallysprints in Kazakhstan. She did some rallysprint events in 2019, still in the C2. The first of these gave her a runner-up spot. 

She does not appear to have competed for the following three years, but she returned to the stages in 2023, driving a Lada. She entered at least two rounds of the Kazakh national championship.

(Image from ticketon.kz)