paris to dakar

[danny_galaga]

i dont know if anyone has been watching this. ive been catching the half hour segment on the telly. lots of action! outright it seems to be a competition between mitsubishi pajeros and vw tourags. in these categories though they hardly look like their namesakes at all! two other makes have impressed me no end. one is hummer, again it doesnt look much like the standard but its doing quite well for such a boofy vehicle. last i looked 8th overall. although they ran out of fuel at one stage and had to beg and borrow off rival motorcyclists and cars. And shock, horror! those aweful bmw w**k mobiles for yuppies, the x3 and x5 (or whatever they are). theres several of these and they DO look almost normal and are doing quite well.

theres also a buggy class, and the schlesser buggy is amazing! it actually won outright in 2000, amazing since its not 4wd and has its work cut out for it in the sand



the motorcyclists are mad! several times ive seen a guy completely shred his back tyre. no matter, he just finishes that stage on the rim!

and most amazing is that the support trucks race!



i first heard about that some years ago when they showed a DAF (that should ---tallywhacker--- up patrickls ears  ) on a tv show. it had twin 11 litre v8 diesels, turboed! good for 200km/h  . i dont think the support trucks are quite as fast anymore. the DAF was running 3rd overall in one race!

ah, this site says that is indeed the case:

http://www.jalopnik.com/cars/daf/doubleradder-than-anything-you-could-possibly-imagine-the-daf-turbo-twin-ii-220711.php


and a vid of one of the dafs overtaking a car:



all the cars and trucks have a transponder to alert the motorcyclists when they are approaching (the bikes are a lot slower in the sand). when a car passes a bike it almost seems like the bike is standing still!

[patrickl]

We always have quite extensive coverige of Paris Dakar here on TV. Indeed I follow the trucks mostly. There is usually a dutch team in contention for the win in that. Unfortunately they usually break down or something. This year no difference. Both of the amazing DAF/GINAF trucks broke down really early this year unfortunately (the DAF engines both brole down). I think one of them was leading at the time.

Now another dutch truck is in the lead though. Hans Stacy is about 3 hours ahead of the rest.

The cool thing about these new trucks is that they basically have the suspension of a car. That's why they drive so fast over the bumps. If you see the older design trucks, they jump up when they hit a bump. On them both wheels are attached to the same axle. The dutch GINAF trucks have indiviual suspension for each wheel. Looks just like a huge SUV when you see them go. A hummer is tiny compared to these behemoths.

The trucks do seem to go a bit slower these days. They maximised the speed at 150km/h for safety, but that's still quite fast on such rough terrain and they still overtake cars. If you look at the overall timesheets, the fastest truck would be in 9th place compared to the cars. Faster than a lot of cars. Just behind the hummer actually.

The trucks don't look so cool as in that picture. A few years ago they decided that the trucks should look like a standard road going model.

The hummer is pretty cool. It looks hideous, but it goes like one of those Baja racers. I always loved those. Dunno why they don't have more of those things in Paris Dakar. Guess it's not really an american thing as it takes place in Europe and Africa.

I'm most impressed with the mitsubishi's though. These cars look so tiny compared to the rest, but they still go seriously fast over the rough terrain. And that for I don't even remember how many years in a row.

[danny_galaga]

well, its finished for another year. the kamaz trucks seemed to do well. and yes, i picked the old daf pics because they looked so cool! although the current trucks that race do have a purposeful look about them which is cool...

i think the hummer stayed in about 8th overall! the schlesser was 3rd overall. mitsubishis almost untouchable this year...

[patrickl]

the kamaz trucks seemed to do well.

Actually there were four brands of trucks that did well. The Kamaz did not win though. Probaly mostly because their star driver crashed early on. Finally a dutch guy won (over 3 hours ahead)! I think hour truck teams have been second or something for years.

It's not like with the bikes where if you don't have a KTM you are practically without a chance.

Volkswagen screwed up again, lol. I love it when manufacturers throw everything they've got at something to win and still they lose. Indeed even Schlesser came in front of them with his third place. The Mitsubishi's (with a french driver) are just impossible to beat though. It's the 12th time they won! This time it's seven in a row. Just bizarre. More than an hour and a half ahead of the rest!

The Pajero maybe tiny compared to the competition, but it's just a clever good car instead of the big brawny crap that can go fast, but in the end just won't keep up (for whatever reason).

They really should sell something that looks like that rally version of the Pajero. Their road going Pajero is just so ugly. I don't see why they can call the rally car a Pajero. The only thing similar to a Pajero is the logo on the front.

I really hope Volkswagen  gives up and that they give Audi a chance to try. Somehow Volkswagen is just a crappy brand for racing. have they ever won anything? I know they own Audi, but send Audi to race and they win (Le mans for instance). besides, the Touareg is even more ugly than the Pajero. An Audi Q7 looks a lot better already.