South African Wins 31st Dakar Rally

by TFleming | January 19, 2009 at 09:39 am

1477 views | 17 Recommendations | 17 comments

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Dakar Rally Argentina-Chile, Exhibition, 305, Team Red Bull, Castrol, Volkswagen, Giniel De Villiers, Dirk Von Zitzewitz, Germa

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uploaded by Benjamin Jakabek

South African Giniel De Villiers finished two seconds ahead of Russian driver Leonid Novitsky to win the 31st Dakar Rally this weekend. The two week race which is traditionally held in Africa was moved to Chili and Argentina this year because of concerns surrounding security in Mauritania which caused the cancellation of last years race. De Villiers finished the last 227 km stretch from Cordoba to Buenos Aires in one hour and 35 mins.

"I was so nervous in the last kilometres," De Villiers said.

"I kept looking at how many kilometres we still had to go.

"But I must say this is an incredible feeling."

De Villiers was handed the lead for the first time during the sixth stage when Qatari Nasser Al Attiyah was disqualified for failing to follow the official route.

He was overtaken the following day by Carlos Sainz but regained the lead on Thursday when the Spaniard crashed out.

De Villiers finished eight minutes 59 seconds ahead of Volkswagen team mate Mark Miller of the United States in the overall standings and one hour 46 minutes ahead of another American Robby Gordon.

Although security issues forced the re-location of the race, the Dakar lived up to its deadly reputation as it claimed the life of French Motorcyclist Pascal Terry who became the 26th death in the 31 year history of the race. He was found three days after he went missing from the race route.

British competitors Paul Green and Matthew Harrison suffered serious injuries after their car overturned in the first stage. Spanish biker Cristobal Guerrero was left in a coma after a crash in the 10th stage.

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Citj (not verified)

at 15:34 on January 19th, 2009

A new NowPublic intern still learning the ropes!

Uwe Paschen

at 10:04 on January 19th, 2009

The second place, Car is Called "Tuareg" there is an interesting article out on Niger 1 about that calling upon Volkswagen to help the Tuaregs in Niger since with some of the profits generated by sales of the Car by the same name "Tuareg" we did actually petition Volkswagen AG last week on that.

"The Dakar Rallye was inspired in Niger, but transfered to Chili and Argentina due to the rebellion in the Sahara .We pray for the rallye to come back to Niger in 2012 , and bring to us its economic opprtunities in our tourism .

The volkswagen Touareg is still leading the rally amid the crash of leader more "

See also what this does to the environment as Charlie Boorman's Race to Dakar covers the environmental, cultural, and economic ramifications of running such a huge rally in North Africa. This can not be much different in South America as far as environmental impact goes.

slaff

at 10:21 on January 19th, 2009

Excelent team work or russian trucks. Amazing argentinian biker, even he´s not winning. It was something new for Argentinian rally stage.

slaff has contributed a photo to this story.

amicor

at 10:36 on January 19th, 2009

Sunday 18th January 2009

After finishing the rally all the teams did a run waving at the crowds.

amicor has contributed a photo to this story.

Claudia Gibson

at 10:45 on January 19th, 2009

It was a wonderful sunny day at Pampa de Oláen, in Córdoba, Argentina.
All pilots waved to the hundreds of fans that gathered there.
Once again, the Rally was a wonderful competition, and the pilots were very happy.

Claudia Gibson has contributed a photo to this story.

Malapersona

at 10:58 on January 19th, 2009

With a large part of public development is the date of the Dakar 2009 in the city of Valparaiso Chile fifth region, where both were synchronized authorities such as the President of Chile, the media, television and written press to make this a world-class event, which was not without its problems because of the large influx of both public rest stations along the route they followed.
This did not stop both the organizers and the pilots of different categories would allow closer both the press and the general public, simplicity and that this provision did was stay in Valparaiso in the visual memory of those who were spectators of the 2009 Dakar Chile-Argentina

Malapersona has contributed a photo to this story.

GEC

at 14:55 on January 19th, 2009

i've post my picture

http://www.flickr.com/photos/megagec/3205516268/

Edmund Jenks

at 15:34 on January 19th, 2009

Top Story!

Great photo and other digital assets.

Thanks for the motorsports TAG!

Agustín Faggiano

at 15:35 on January 19th, 2009

MIZYUKAEV (RUS) y MARDEEV (RUS) desfilando en Palermo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Dakar 2009

Agustín Faggiano has contributed a photo to this story.

Edmund Jenks

at 16:45 on January 19th, 2009

Not new or an intern ... just standing in support of contributors to this Feature Page.

Got any posts to contribute?

As you can tell, a good story supported with highlighted information, photos, and videos are grand currency for this Feature Page.

Good Luck.

ignacio.varas

at 01:00 on January 20th, 2009

It was madness, i´m from Santiago (The capital of Chile), and i have never seen something like that, it was a road of only two ways and in some parts were around 4 or 5 lines of parking cars, the road was stuck. I walk 45 minutes from my car (on the top off the hill) to the nearest store to buy water and something to eat.

I follow every step of Dakar in Chile, was amazing, incredible pictures, great people, A GREAT EXPERIENCE.

ignacio.varas has contributed a photo to this story.

Martín Carné (not verified)

at 03:58 on January 20th, 2009

It was really amazing having those gladiators cruising our country here in Argentina !!! As a spectator I was surprised by the feedback we received from them, specially from the bikers and the huge trucks: they were waving to us while passing through all along our country roads!! We really appreciate having this great event here!! Thanks a lot!! Martín Carné