Dakar Rally
 

Is anyone here following it? The Dakar is the Whitbread on land, what an amazing race.

One of the top bike riders was killed and all the other riders took the day off in respect. It is a very tough race which takes it's toll. Mostly on the bike riders.

Howdy All,
I can't find it on the channels I get so I have just been getting reports on a Mog list. The last report I saw had a Unimog in the top 10.

Kind of closer to the old BOC Challenge (Now race for Volvo Trophy), no?;)

Every day on Eurosport channel. Race gets really interesting after the first week (so this week) when they hit the deserts. Rallye has become a MEGA event, which unfortunately has taken away some of it's original, primitive, survival-like character (when it was still called 'Paris-Dakar'). The camera work from the helicopters is terrific. No Ferrari's though...;)

PS: This year's Whitbread/Volvo race looks like a complete fiasco, can hardly be called a race anymore. Don't even watch it, even though a Dutch boat is leading in the Southern Ocean. Pity, used to be such an awesome challenge. America's Cup has much more appeal these days.

The scenery is breathtaking. The concept is mindboggling. I 4x4 in a Scout Terra and a journey like that would be epic at sedate speeds. What they are doing is nuts. The bikers? Having wrestled a 500 MX'r through sand and mud I have some idea of the kind of energy that is expended by the bikers. Those are big bikes with lots of gas and just a few minutes wrestling with one stuck in sand would tap me out, and the balls to maintain that kind of speed, WoW! Those bikers are a different breed. They have to be on steroids.
I don't think even the fittest human could maintain that without help.

What's even more incredible is the privateer bikers. Less than stellar equipment. Often near double the time in the saddle and as a result half the rest time, and durring the rest time you do maintenace and repairs because you have no crew. Sleep deprivation, exhaustion, and high speed racing. Yeah!

Jorg

I agree about the Whitbread, I was referring to the Around Alone Race that used to be sponsored by BOC. I mistakenly thought it was now called the race for the Volvo Trophy (I think BOC got out of the race, but not sure). The old BOC took balls. I met all of the captains in the '94 race and they ranged from a 21 YO Italian kid with a $20+M budget to a 65 YO Brit who was sailing his own raggedy rig (he died during the race, incidentially).

Small world, I was visiting my girlfriend who was a student at College of Charleston at the time of the BOC start. '94 was great for sailboat racing the Whitbread was still a race the AC was still competitive I wore the official Ralph Lauren A3 team jacket....oh yea times were good.

anyway we went down to the DOC's after having dinner at that good restaurant across the street, I couldn't believe that I was right there with the boats and I BS'd with a few of the racers. I don't know who they were but it was and experience to put in the diary for sure.

World boat races and the Dakar are truly the pinnacle of racing IMO.

Cool. I didn't have internet in '94, but you could join the VIP BOC Honorary Race Committee for a small fee and we got to hang out on the docks without escort, all of the pre-parties and most importantly, had year-long access to the IBM tracking center so that we could monitor the boats! Do you remember Christine Auguine, the French woman who was leading, only to capsize and dismast going around the Horn?

I don't want this to be taken in any other vein than humor, but the funniest thing I saw during the week before the race kicked off was a non-sponsored guy from Taiwan. He was in a 38 ft. cutter rigged boat and was about 5'5". Spoke no English whatsoever, but a blast to hang out with. The day before the boats left, he and a friend with a dolly loaded what had to have been 50 cases of canned Budweiser onto his boat! We fell out laughing and gave him the thumbs up.

The Dakar race is amazing.

I also respect anyone who races in the Whitbread or the Volvo around the world race. You need serious balls to do those races, their is a good chance of dieing in those races. Lots of boats lose their keels and go over, even if your epirb goes off chances are rescue is days if not weeks away.

Makes Nascar look like a sunday drive.:rolleyes:

OLN.

http://www.emercedesbenz.com/Dec05/22MercedesEntersDakarRally.html


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Yeah i was watching part of it today. I like how they are running the TDI Touregs. slick stuff there. But i think that the bikes they are useing are too much for paved surfaces. A dirtbike would fair much better. As for the trucks that was my favorite part of the recap.

OLN out bid Speed Channel for coverage of the Dakar Rally. I don't subscribe to OLN so I am doing without. Really enjoyed the Dakar the past few years though.

Hey, Frank - my main claim to fame was being in Newport during the America Cup races. (Of course, they were being held in Freemantle that year, but that's a different story......):D

Wes