2012 DAKAR Rally
On 1 January 2012, the 33rd edition of the world’s toughest rally started in Mar del Plata on the east coast of Argentina. The former Paris to Dakar (or just “Dakar” to its friends) moved to the South American continent after terrorist threats in Africa saw the 2008 event cancelled.
This year, 177 bikes, 25 quads, 155 cars and 73 trucks raced over 14 stages through Argentina, Chile and Peru to the finish in Lima. The incredibly beautiful scenery challenged participants with everything from sand, rock, mud, snow, dust (the infamous fesh-fesh) and wildly differing temperatures.
Although a few stages were modified (and one cancelled) and the various vehicles often follow different routes, anyone who made it to the finish would have covered in excess of 8,300km. Of the original starters, only 97 motorbikes, 11 quads, 78 cars and 60 trucks made the epic journey.
BIKES
Winner in the bike category was Frenchman Cyril Depres who just pipped his Spanish KTM teammate, Marc Coma, after one of the Dakar’s closest and most exciting battles in the bike division. Portugese rider Helder Rodriguez took the last podium position with a sterling effort on his Yamaha.
The remainder of the top ten was made up the KTM’s of Jordi Viladoms, Stefan Svitko, Pal Anders Ullevalseter, Gerard Farres Guell, Allesandro Botturi, Felipe Zanol and the lone Yamaha of Olivier Pain in 9th place. Tragically, Argentine rider Jorge Andrés Martinez died after crashing on stage 1.
CARS
Another Frenchman and Dakar legend, Stephane Peterhansel, took his 10th Dakar victory (6 on bikes) in a Mini ALL4 Racing, followed by his teammate Joan Roma. Third place went to 2009 Dakar winner and last year’s runner up, Giniel de Villiers with his faithful German navigator, Dirk von Zitzewitz.
After Volkswagen withdrew from the Dakar, de Villiers found a drive in the Imperial / Toyota S.A. Hilux Pick-up. The announcement was made in October last year at the Johannesburg International Motor Show and the team had only a few months to test the new vehicle.
The 350hp V8-powered Hilux already complies with 2013 rules and absolved 9,000km of Namib desert testing. Paired with de Villiers’ trademark consistency, the Hilux returned regular top five results and saw the team slowly creep up the rankings to third position which they held until the end.
Fourth to tenth place went to Leonid Novitskiy (Mini), Robby Gordon (Hummer), Lucio Alvarez (Toyota), Carlos Sousa (Great Wall), Ricardo Leal dos Santos (Mini), Bernar Ten Brinke (Mitsubishi) and Krzysztof Holowczyc (Mini).
QUADS
Top finisher in the quad category was Alejandro Patronelli, followed by his brother Marcos in second position and Tomas Maffei in third place, all three Argentineans riding on Yamaha quads and finishing within about an hour or two of each other.
Of the remaining finishers there were five Yamahas (Ignacio Casale, Sergio La Fuente, Roberto Tonetti, Camélia Liparoti), three Can-Ams in 8th (Daniel Mazzucco), 10th (Barry Cruces) and 11th place (Petar Cenkov) and a Honda in 7th position (Lucas Bonetto).
TRUCKS
The truck category was won by Dutchman Gérard de Rooy in a new long-nose Iveco, 25 years after his father Jan won the Dakar. Fellow countryman and Iveco pilot Hans Stacey came in second position with Artur Ardavichus’s Kamaz taking the final podium place.
Making up the rest of the top ten were Andrey Karginov (Kamaz), Ilgizar Mardeev (Kamaz), Miki Biasion (Iveco), Martin Kolomy (Tatra), André De Azevedo (Tatra), Teruhito Sugawara (Hino) and Pieter Versluis (MAN).
LOCALS
Other local entries in the Dakar were off-road legend Alfie Cox in a Volvo which unfortunately burnt out in the first stage of the event. Duncan Vos ran another Toyota Hilux with navigator Robert Howie and just lost out on a top ten position, eventually ending in a respectable 11th position overall.
Mark Corbett and Francois Jordaan had entered the Dakar before in 2008 (which was cancelled) but completed their first Dakar this year in a CR4 Century Racing vehicle with 24th overall position. Four South Africans competed in the bike category this year:
Two time Roof of Africa winner, Darryl Curtis, brought his KTM 450 Replica home to 22nd place. Greg Raaf on an identical bike eventually finished 83rd, while teammate Neil Scott-Williams and Iain Stevenson on a KTM 450 Rally both retired by stage 5.
All images (c) DAKAR 2012.
