RUST magazine: RUST#41

tRAIL
PERUVIAN
GUINEA PIGS
The ASO tried a new format for the Dakar Rally this year. Ten days
in one country, with one dominant terrain – sand. It worked, kind
of. But is this the future of Dakar? Who better to ponder, maybe
even answer, that, then our trail riding, rally recce-ing Anglo-
Kiwi-Parisian Chris Evans (former press officer with the ASO)…
Words: Chris Evans Captions: JB
Images: Marcin Kin (KTM/Husqvarna), Florent Gooden,
Marcello Maragni, Flavien Duhamel, Frederic Le Floch (Red
Bull), MCH Photo (Honda/Yamaha/Monster Energy)
Well, that’s another Dakar
been and gone and as
always it came up with
its fair share of surprises.
The first was that despite, for the first
time in its history, being confined
to a single country, the entry was
nevertheless respectable. I know that
the organisers ASO were very worried
that nobody would want to come if it
was just Peru but happily for them that
turned out not to be the case. Quite
why that should have been is unclear
– I mean, in terms of adventure it
isn’t exactly like riding from Paris
to Cape Town. It could be that the
adventure side of things is pretty much
irrelevant these days. With constant
tracking, GPS, distress beacons and a
loud speaker fitted to your handlebars
with which you can talk directly to
race control, the out-on-my-ownin-the-middle-of-nowhere
aspect
has largely fallen by the wayside. It
could also be that certain privateer
entrants decided that it was the perfect
opportunity to do a Dakar and cross
it off the list, reasoning that shorter
distances and less days equalled a
greater chance of a finish. As it turned
out they miscalculated on that front, as
withdrawals were well within statistical
norms. What is certainly very true is
that you can’t wipe out 40 odd years of
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