Archive for Rally Raid
Mini All4 racing X-raid team and Pewano Team Volvo XC60 CC release exciting news for Rally Raid fans. The Dakar 2010 will see a Team Xraid entrance with the all new All4 Racing Monster Energy Mini driven by the all French rally crew of rally pilot Guerlain Chicherit and co-driver Michel Périn in January’s 33rd Dakar Argentina-Chile rally Raid. The new MINI All4 Racing will form part of X-raid’s seven-car Dakar team – the largest ever entered by a team in the 33-year history of the world’s most famous off-road rally – and the third of three vehicles running on the event under the Monster Energy X-raid Team banner. Read More→
Monster Energy and the BMW X-raid Team have joined forces to create the Monster Energy X-raid Team, which will tackle January’s 33rd Personal Dakar Argentina-Chile (2011 Dakar Rally) in South America. The Trebur-based operation will field seven cars in the world’s most famous off-road rally, with Monster Energy supporting three of the teams. Peterhansel is the most successful driver in the history of the Dakar Rally. He won the race six times on a motorcycle, before switching to racing on four-wheels in 1999. Partnered by Jean-Paul Cottret, Peterhansel claimed three victories in the Dakar on four wheels and finished fourth overall with the X-raid Team on the 2010 Dakar in South America – his first with the German team. Read More→
The Rallye Aïcha des Gazelles is a human adventure that is one of a kind. It is the only Rally Raid for women only. Since 1990, the event has been bringing together women between 18 and 65 years of age, from 33 different countries, in the Moroccan desert. The Rallye Aïcha des Gazelles is developing a new vision of automobile competition: no speed and no GPS, just old fashioned navigation, completely off-road. With determination as the only selection criterion, whatever their age, social background, nationality or experience, the participants in this rally come to experience, behind the wheel of a 4WD, Crossover, Quad, truck or motorbike, a competition without speed, that respects the local populations and the environment. All Rallye participants, known as “Gazelles”, leave this adventure marked forever by the experience: they push their limits, have to face themselves, far from their sometimes difficult daily lives as women; there is also a strong element of sharing and mutual Read More→
Peterhansel, Novitskiy and Holowczyc complete X-raid 1-2-3, Guerlain Chicherit claims fifth, Leal dos Santos finishes seventh, BMW X-raid completes comprehensive pre-Dakar test session. Stéphane Peterhansel and Jean-Paul Cottret clinched an emphatic victory for the BMW X-raid team in the six-day OiLibya Rally of Morocco on Saturday. The French duo finished the punishing desert cross-country rally 55m 28s in front of team mates Leonid Novitskiy and Andreas Schulz, as Poland’s Krzysztof Holowczyc and Belgian co-driver Jean-Marc Fortin finished third in their PKN Orlen-backed BMW X3 CC and completed a superb 1-2-3 finish for Sven Quandt’s Trebur-based team. First day technical problems cost the French crew of Guerlain Chicherit and Michel Périn their chance of reaching the podium, but last year’s FIA World Cup winner was on the pace over the remaining five days and climbed back to finish fifth overall. Read More→
Great Berber tribe Ait-Attas live on a vast territory extending from the High Atlas to the Algerian border. They welcome this 5th step of the rally, drawn in the mountains east of Zagora. 307 km, Liaisons 58 km, selective sector 249 km. On today’s program, track, track and yet the track: uphill, downhill, fast, dusty, sandy, rocky, rolling, technical. A special will be crowned the most regular drivers. Through the 248km of selective section, competitors will chain passes and plains from the track of the foothills to Ait Ouzik. Short in terms of km, this stage is dense, and still could create upheaval in the classification in case of pilot’s errors or puncture. Competitors must learn to listen to their vehicles and manage mechanical trouble. Tip of the day: sometimes it’s better to wait for overtake, at the risk of losing everything by being out of the track. Read More→
The rally made its second stop in the Chegaga for an original crossing and spectacular in two loops of 160km with neutralized assistance of 30’ for all competitors. It starts without further delay in off-track through a small erg of little tricky dunes with some crossings to reach a fast and technical track. Ideal to make sure everything is in order to attack the main dish of the Rally OiLibya du Maroc 2010! Km 56, it is hard at work against the big dunes of Erg which must be climbed and sometimes jumped, as the ridges are broken. Welcome to the roller coaster! The pilots must be talented to overcome the mountains of more or less soft sand, the co-pilots will have to be the best during 20km to hope validating the WPM. The GPS will be activated down to less than 400 meters from the Waypoint often hidden by the dunes. The CP1 will act as a magistrate, after bad little dunes and multiple traps. Read More→
This third stage, with no real technical difficulty, is unprecedented. It will offer the best scenery of the rally. However, it will not be a walkover: 280 km of tracks to devour in one gulp, without possibility of external assistance. The start is given off-track from the palm of Zagora to join a rugged mountain trail. After the first pass, the track widens to become fast… but sometimes becomes dusty and undulated. The objective of the day is the magnificent passage of Maharch. Big tasks ahead in term of navigation for competitors that will ensure change of directions and monitoring of capes through dunes and sandy oueds. After the passage, the pleasure is guaranteed for competitors and TV viewers. Pleasure for drivers too, with the crossing of high sandy passes (sand is sometimes very soft) and a long descent before to smash through the big dry lakes: Read More→
OiLybia Rally of Morocco first 2 days of competition. At day one, Peterhansel and Despres open the rally raid. Mountainous, winding and rocky tracks followed by sandy dunes all the way to Foum Zguid, then it was full throttle to the finish line in Tagounite: The Organizers called it “The unavoidable”, this first stage of the OiLybia Rally of Morocco will leave indelible memories in the minds of all competitors. Three hundred and ten kilometers on the clock, which for many of them, were much, much more than just a warm-up. At the cars BMW is laughing and Chicherit is crying! It was as predictable as the sun shining over Tagounite (the arrival village of this first stage): the XRaid team succeeded. Leaving first this morning, Stéphane Peterhansel and Jean-Pol Cottret (BMW X3 No. 300) escaped, relegating their closest teammates, twenty minutes behind them. Read More→
Peterhansel and Cottret aiming for third Morocco success, Guerlain Chicherit teams up with Michel Périn in Morocco, Holowczyc, Novitskiy and Leal Dos Santos complete X-raid line-up. The BMW X-raid Team has entered five BMW X3 CCs in the OiLibya Rally of Morocco as an integral part of the build-up and preparation for January’s Dakar Rally in South America. The non-championship event takes place in the Zagora region of the North African country between October 17-23rd, 2010. Frenchman Stéphane Peterhansel and co-driver Jean-Paul Cottret won the rally for the Treburbased X-raid team in 2009 and they head the official team entry. Fellow countryman Guerlain Chicherit also faces the six-day Moroccan challenge and takes part in his first event with the X-raid team since steering his BMW X3 CC to fifth overall in this year’s Dakar Rally. The defending FIA World Cup champion Read More→
