Belt up boy, there is a new sheriff in town - Mionki Tuta

Mionki Tuta [Courtesy]

Belt up, boy. There is a new sheriff in town. She is brainy, passionate and likes her rally car smoking and bloody fast.

Tuta Mionki, 42, who was announced 2018 Motorsports Personality of Year award winner, a first in the in the history of the sport, grew up watching the Safari Rally with her father in Meru. The fast-moving beasts cutting through hills in the morning chill would pump up the adrenalin in her puny chest as cars slid through mud or span off the roads. Slowly, fear grew into great love.

She was a Safari Rally fan all through school, never missing an event. But when adulthood came, thrusting her into the world of work and HR at Kenya Airways, BAT, ZTE and Java House, among others, she wanted to rally.

That journey begun in 2011, when she started off as a Rally Raider – a different motorsport discipline – before getting to proper rallying in 2012 when she strapped into Eric Bengi’s co-driver’s seat.

“I wanted to drive, but I did not have the car, so I got into the navigator’s seat and realised it’s something that I could do well. So I stuck to it,” says the HR consultant.

She grew up watching Safari Rally with her father [Courtesy]

Her work as a navigator is to guide the driver by reading the pace notes and keeping time. All her senses are alert during a rally and eyes wide open not to lose track. It is frustrating when you miss a thing in the pace-notes because it can land you in big trouble, she says. 

“Sometimes last year, during the Guru Nanak Rally, I got mixed up on the pace notes and got lost. It slowed us down in the race. I can’t forget that frustrating moment,” she says.

The sport is expensive. In 2018, for instance, they used about Sh8 million to compete in all the events, which eventually saw her being crowned the best. Together with her driver, Eric Bengi, they drove in Subaru N12, a car she loves for its top speed. Tuta, no pun, likes it fast and furious.

The other cars she’s competed in include Toyota Vitz, Subaru Impreza GC8, Subaru N10 and Toyota Run X, and they’re now gearing for the use of Subaru Evo 10 for 2019 season.

“I love the top speed of both the Subaru N10 and N12. We are now moving to an Evo 10 this season and it’s a whole new ball game. Faster around corners and more grounded,” she says.

So far in her career, Tuta has ridden shotgun for five drivers: Victor Okundi, Steve Gacheru, Helen Shiri, Murage Waigwa and Eric Bengi.

Apart from rallying, Tuta, born in a family of seven, is a fulltime Human Resource Consultant and the Autocross Commission Chair Person at Kenya Motorsport Federation.

She holds the Kenya Motor Sports Federation Awards for the best co-driver of the season 2015 (Division 3) and 2016 (2-wheel-drive) and prides as being the first indigenous Kenyan girl team to compete out of the country when she participated in the Pearl Of Africa rally in Uganda.

Biggest challenge? Toilets! She says while men can duck behind a single leaf and irrigate the nation, many are the times she has been forced to dart into nearby homes and request to use the washroom.

Not that has stopped her vrooming to the podium.