Dakar 2016: Plan B, fast, very fast!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Carlos
  • 73 comments
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What class is your favorite?

  • Car

    Votes: 40 70.2%

  • Truck

    Votes: 17 29.8%

  • Bike

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Quad

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    57
Is this the Dakar 2016 thread? Or the "Bash Robby Gordon for the lulz" thread?

Anyways, Stephane Petterhansel won today's stage (and lead a Peugeot 1-2-3 on the time sheets), but Sebastian Loeb still has the overall lead.
 
No Gordon bashing here. I just really enjoy seeing trucks get stuck :D. "Truck Got Stuck" is one of my all time favourite songs :lol:
 
It's just too easy to bash Robby Gordon because of his personality, he will never win the Dakar because of it. Not only does being an hot-head get him in trouble more than anybody else it also keeps him in a rubbish/unreliable car each year, he's a rich man so could've easily bought a seat at one of the successful customer teams like X-Raid if he hadn't said their cars were for girls.

Moving on from the amateurs I'm really enjoying the rally so far, Loeb's debut has been brilliant but the big test will come when the rally moves on to the dunes, totally new territory for him and Daniel Elena, the Peugeot will be very quick there since it's already winning on what are in theory it's bad stages. Assuming there are no reliability issues (which is the big question mark given last year and Sainz's early issues this time) I think Peterhansel will win.

Edit:
Rule #1 of showing off: Don't do this:
 
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Gordon told NBCSN after stage 4 that the entire field is down on power to the Pug and said that there is no way the Pug is using a production engine. He also said that this is likely his team's last Dakar.

and he copped a 1 hr penalty for "speeding" in the mud pit and is appealing.
 
Let's just forget about Robby Gordon for a moment, and give some love to his teamate Sheldon Creed. His wipers failed in the middle of a hailstorm, and he couldnt see out of the window.
Now, your normal person would try to fix the wipers. Instead, he kicked a hole in the window, put on some goggles, and got on with it. I think Robby will be proud.
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aarror
Let's just forget about Robby Gordon for a moment, and give some love to his teamate Sheldon Creed. His wipers failed in the middle of a hailstorm, and he couldnt see out of the window.
Now, your normal person would try to fix the wipers. Instead, he kicked a hole in the window, put on some goggles, and got on with it. I think Robby will be proud.
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Wipers broke the day before, they didn't fix it because it was a marathon stage. They only broke the window when it completely misted/fogged over during the storm. Pretty good idea/quick thinking imo

Is it just me or are the Gordini's seemingly more catered to the pre-South America Dakar (even though they never ran it...) or that type of stage?
 
Yesterday Sebastien Loeb lost the lead to Peterhansel, but today he took it back. Carlos Sainz won the stage by 38s.
 
I don't know what it is but this year the Dakar feels a bit blah.
 
Still a couple of checkpoints to go but It's good to see Al-Attiyah leading today. Perhaps this section lends itself to AWD more than 2WD.
 
Not sure what hapeened to Seb Loeb, but he's 8 minutes down from Al Attiyah at the moment.
 
JC_Dude
Not sure what hapeened to Seb Loeb, but he's 8 minutes down from Al Attiyah at the moment.
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He had to dig himself out of the sand on one of the first dunes of this years race, but that's nothing compared to his current problems. Reports are that he has rolled 30km from the finish and is trying to drag a badly damaged car back to bivouac. Huge time being lost and any chance of the win is gone.
 
Looks a bit of a mess.

Close run thing between Sainz and Al-attiyah... pretty tense just watching the WP times appear :lol:

I'm glad MINI are just about able to keep in touch with the Puggys, though I think either Peterhansel or Sainz have it in the bag.

I have to say the Dakar really does throw out the best photography in all of Motorsports, imho. Some of the pics being posted on social media etc. are stunning.
 
Yeah he's 1h behind, sadly win is getting away. There's always a thing with dunes and new french driver tho lol. Remember Gerlain Chicherit when he was testing what would be the new mini ?



Here's a pic of the outcome :
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Going from too much water to too much heat.

Today's route has been shortened because of the extreme heat.
 
How they managed to get that thing back together enough to finish the stage, I have no idea. That's amazing.
 
So, the Mini X-Raid team launched a protest against Peterhansel saying that he refuelled his car in a non-timed section which is illegal. Peterhansel was not given a penalty and cleared of any wrongdoing. X-Raid are now appealing the decision.
 
GTracer38
So, the Mini X-Raid team launched a protest against Peterhansel saying that he refuelled his car in a non-timed section which is illegal. Peterhansel was not given a penalty and cleared of any wrongdoing. X-Raid are now appealing the decision.
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Crucially if found guilty on appeal (which is unlikely now he has been cleared) he could face exclusion or a 6 hour time penalty.
 
Good day for Loeb, bad for Carlos Sainz. The Frenchman managed to climb from P13 to P9, 2h27m behind leader Peterhansel. With some luck and without any more problem he might be able to jump Mikko Hirvonen, currently P4, 1h3m in front. Carlos Sainz meanwhile suffered multiple issues and has not finished the stage yet (he started first, winner Peterhansel finished over 4h ago).
 
Mini's hopes also took a battering with Nassar Al Attiyah losing more than 50 minutes from a roll over.

Peterhansel just has to finish without drama now...still a tough ask on the Dakar.
 
I saw my first bit of coverage of this year's Dakar Rally with the highlight show on Sunday on NBCSN. The first time I followed Dakar was back in 2002. This is the world's toughest rally year after year. It is certainly the finest rally raid/cross-country rally in the world. Even if it isn't raced in Africa, this is still brutal to both driver and machine.

As for the poll question, I am surely about the "Cars." Those are my idea of "big cars" much like the BMW X6. I mentioned 2002. Around that time, I recall the Mitsubishi Pajero Evolution like in Gran Turismo 4. I sort of remember the Nissan Navara like in Enthusia Professional Racing. As for the other classes of competition... I couldn't imagine doing any kind of off-road racing in those hulking Trucks. I don't hate them; they are just real fascinating seeing those big machines race off-road. It takes courage to race on four wheels, and it takes even more to race on two wheels. So I respect the heck out of the Bike riders that do Dakar. I never really been interested by ATVs, but I'd say it's tougher to race this deal on an ATV.

So all in all, it's great to see another Dakar Rally being run considering the long history of this rally raid.
 
There's an intense battle between Loeb and Peterhansel on stage 11. Seb was 29s in front after CP1, then 1s in front after CP2, 4s after CP3. The gap is now just 8 seconds.
 
Impressive those images from Loeb. He is flying and his driving looks spectacular. Great to watch 👍


To bad , once again a problem for Loeb :sick: Finished being pulled by his teammate.
 
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