Dakar Rally

The Dakar Rally (or simply "The Dakar"; formerly known as "The Paris Dakar Rally" and now as "The Lisbon Dakar Rally") is an annual off-road race, organised by the Amaury Sport Organisation. The race is open to amateur and professional entries; amateurs typically make up about eighty percent of the participants.

Despite its name, it is an off-road endurance race rather than a conventional rally – the terrain the competitors traverse is much tougher and the vehicles used are true off-road vehicles rather than the modified sedans used in rallies. Most of the competitive specials are off-road, crossing dunes, mud, camel grass, rocks, erg, among others. The distances of each stage covered vary from several kilometers to several hundred kilometers per day.


 2009 Route 2010 Route

History and Route

The race originated in 1978, a year after racer Thierry Sabine got lost in the desert and decided this would be a good location for a regular rally. Originally, the rally was from Paris, France to Dakar, Senegal, interrupted by a transfer across the Mediterranean; however due to politics and other factors, the course, including origin and destination, have varied over the years. Dakar has been the destination city on all but four occasions. The rally began at Paris each year until 1995. The previous year, the rally both began and ended in Paris, but due to complaints by the mayor, the finish had to be moved from the Champs-Élysées to Euro Disney. This also caused the organisation to lay out the rally through different locations in following years.

Complete list of routes

Today's rallies pass through Buenose Aeries over the Andes into Chile and deserts of Atacama . The segments running though the Atacam sand dunes and the Andes may be the most challenging in all off-road racing.

In 1992, Hubert Auriol won the Dakar in an automobile after having previously won the motorcycle competition on two occasions, making him the first driver to win on both two and four wheels.

Vehicles and Classes

The three major competitive classes of the Dakar are:

Many vehicle manufacturers exploit the harsh environment the rally offers as a testing ground, and consequently to demonstrate the durability of their vehicles, although most vehicles are heavily modified.

Automobile Class

Porsche 959 racing the 1986 Dakar Rally.

Nissan Navara Lisbon-Dakar 2006
Originally, European utility vehicles like the Land Rover, Range Rover, Mercedes-Benz G, Volkswagen Iltis and the Pinzgauer, as well the Japanese Toyota Land Cruiser, dominated the race. Other manufacturers have entered heavily modified street vehicles such as Rolls-Royce, Citroën, Peugeot (405 T16 and 205 T16) and even Porsche.

In 2003, examples in the Automobile Class included the Mitsubishi Pajero/Montero, the Volkswagen Race Touareg, and the Nissan Navara. Mercedes Benz M, BMW X5 and BMW X3, Hummer H1 and Hummer H3 sport-utilities were represented but did not appear in the leader positions. Jean-Louis Schlesser built a series of custom dune buggy vehicles for the race, and has won with them several times. American ("Baja") style pro trucks have also made appearances, but they have seldom won. At the present some of the main competitors in the car class are Volkswagen, Mitsubishi and Nissan.

The Full Size Truck Class

Unimog U400L n.541 on second stage of the rally-raid Lisbon-Dakar 2006

Russian KAMAZ Seven times Dakar winner.

The Full Size Truck Class ("T4" "Camions" or "Lorries") include Tatra, LIAZ, Kamaz, Hino, MAN, DAF, PERLINI, Mercedes-Benz Unimog, Renault Kerax, SCANIA, IVECO, GINAF. In the 1980s, a strong rivalry between DAF and Mercedes-Benz led to vehicles which had twin engines and more than 1000 hp (750 kW). Later Tatra, Perlini and Kamaz took the race up. After 2000, renewed competition started in the truck class between DAF, Tatra, Mercedes-Benz and Kamaz.

Motorcycle Manufacturers Class

The most popular of the Motorcycle Manufacturers Class in the race series would be KTM and Yamaha, as many of their Motorcycles have finished in top positions over the years. Also BMW motorcycles have been quite successful in Dakar.

Television Coverage

The English television coverage of the rally is narrated by Toby Moody, a retired motorcycle rider whose distinct accent (especially pronouncing foreign names such as "Schless-ah", "Shi-no-zoo-ker" and "Me-oh-nee") adds to the personality of the race.

  1. Over 600 hours of programming broadcast across 178 countries.
  2. In the United States and Canada, Versus (formerly OLN) aired 16 daily half-hour segments and four hours of wrap-up coverage, and will repeat these shows in the coming months.
  3. In France alone, 83% of the population viewed Dakar Rally images, an average of 8.2 times each.
  4. Over 75 television channels broadcast the 16 daily 26-minute programs produced and distributed by the Dakar Rally during the event.
  5. Over 25 international television channels augmented this program with direct feeds from crews on the ground at the rally.

The Speed Channel devoted a half-hour per day in 2003 and 2004 to the event before being outbid by the Outdoor Life Network for 2005. OLN programmed an hour-long retrospective after the event concluded. In 2006, OLN has upped its coverage to half-hour long nightly stage recaps including reporters traveling in the bivouacs. The Versus (TV channel) (formally Outdoor Life Network) is covering half an hour segments of the 2009 Dakar Rally, daily showtimes are at 3:00 PM North American Eastern Standard Time Zone and repeats can be seen at varying times.

In Europe the coverage is also covered by EuroSport. In 2009 Eurosport both shows live feeds and some reruns the next day of the past days live show.
 
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