Dakar Rally 2011 - Finish.

Congratulations to Nasser Al-Attiyah on winning his first Dakar rally. Nasser kept out of trouble, didn't seem to suffer from as many punctures as the others and his car was good as gold, all the things that need to come together to win such a grueling endurance event as the Dakar. It's a great achievement for the Qatari and I can see him winning many more Dakar rallies in the future.

Carlos Sainz eventually finished 3rd, behind his teammate Giniel de Villiers, after having a few terrible stages. On Stage 10 he got the car stuck on a hill with no one to help him, losing 18min 13sec, and then on Stage 11 he hit a hole and broke the suspension on his Touareg 3 losing a further 1h 14min 50sec which put him completely out of contention. Sainz drove well for the rest of the rally and now holds the record for Dakar stage wins in the car class with 24, beating Peterhansel who has 23 wins.

With a 1-2-3 finish for Volkswagen I don't see that they have anything else to prove on the Dakar. I wonder will they be back next year? There have been rumours going around for quite a while of Volkswagen entering the WRC, which is very exciting. It would be great to see them there, especially as their great German rival BMW is starting a full WRC campaign in 2012 with MINI. It will also be very interesting to see if VW Group choose to use a diesel engine in their WRC car like they have done in almost all of their motorsport activities in recent years.

Final results:
http://www.dakar.com/dakar/2011/us/stage-13/rankings/overall-cars-page-1.html

Dakar Update

So it's now a full week into the Dakar and it is as spectacular as ever. As I had hoped, Carlos Sainz is leading in his Volkswagen with a margin of 1min 22sec over his team mate Nasser Al-Attiyah. Stephane Peterhansel now trails by 21mins 11 sec in his BMW, this is mostly due to a succession of punctures. There is still a long way to go and anything could happen. The battle between Sainz and Al-Attiyah is really hotting up with only 9 seconds separating them on Stage 6. If they keep pushing each other this hard it could easily lead to mistakes that might let Peterhansel back into the fight.

Robby Gordon had a terrible Dakar 2011, he really had no luck at all. He lost time in the rain on Stage 1 due to only having 2wd in the slippery conditions and he had to swap helmets with his navigator during the stage because of a broken microphone. He lost an hour on Stage 2 due to getting the car stuck off the road, he then had several transmission problems and was finally excluded on Stage 4 for not being able to getting a wheel bearing changed in the time allowed. It's a real pity that he didn't make it as far as the proper sand dunes as his Hummer looks brilliant floating along the sand at high speed.


Video of Stage 6, 2011:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOFA0GYezdA&feature=player_embedded

Dakar 2011

The Dakar Rally kicked off yesterday from Buenos Aires and while I don't follow any other rally raid events I do love the Dakar. It's just such a monstrous event at over 9,500km. It must be one of the last truly epic motorsport events and the television images that it produces are absolutely stunning.

Volkswagen have once again turned out in force and I can't see them being beaten. I will be rooting for a second victory for Carlos Sainz. The man is a true legend in rallying and he is a great ambassador for the sport.

I watched an interview with Robby Gordon on Eurosport and he thinks he is in with a chance this year. He has a new lighter, more powerful car so he could well do it. He put on a great performance last year taking a stage win and in 2009 he finishing 3rd overall. I wish him luck but in truth, I can't see a 2wd car being able to take the victory.