Most liked posts in thread: Rally Dakar 2012

Indeed, purpose-built vehicles -- built by neither MINI nor BMW -- where purpose = success at Dakar. You build the chassis, suspension, drive train, etc, and then fit a body shell and any other associated bits and pieces you can that won't detract from function.

I haven't seen that side-by-side bit with Quandt, I'll watch for it. Thanks for the heads-up.

 

I'd like to hear the rest of the Al-Attiyah story. Gordon stopped to help him a couple times in early stages which surprised me because those were very team-oriented actions. According to Gordon after one of the worst of those early delays Al-Attiyah was ready to quit and go home. No word on whether that was because Al-Attiyah blamed the quality of the Hummer for his performance and thought it wasn't worthy of his effort or he just wasn't having fun because he wasn't winning so he didn't want to play anymore.

I thought Gordon made an excellent point after Al-Attiyah eventually called it quits and went home. He said, and rightly so IMO, the guy could have hung in there as a supporting team player like Gordon did for him early on and probably finish around 5th place anyway but he decided to quit instead.

It's only a two car team so I can understand how having his only other supporting player quit on him would add to his frustration. Top that with the official disqualification and competitors calling him a cheat plus a lot of late hours trying to keep things together and it's no surprise he's right up there at the boiling point.

To be honest, I'm surprised to be defending him as I'm far from a fan. He's running the rest of the rally under appeal and won't know the result of the appeal for weeks. If it turns out he really is running an illegal system I'll gladly call that the main reason for his tension and that ridiculous outburst.

Does everyone following along understand the reason he was disqualified?

 

Alan - True, not the first time, won't be the last. The history of LeMans is particularly full of examples.

Mark - He and/or Al-Attiyah absolutely did have the outright pace of the field on some stages. But either the Hummers couldn't sustain that outright pace on Dakar terrain or the drivers made extra mistakes because they were pushing so hard, because they had more problems and mechanical issues than anyone else running near the front. Gordon finished 5th on outright time, that's not down to any penalty. The appeal will only decide whether his disqualification will be overturned (I think we can all guess how that will go). If it's overturned, he gets to keep the 5th place standing he earned.

 

MINI Motorsport's Stage 2 report:

Peterhansel flexes his muscles.

 

Stage 3 report:

Holowczyc moves into pole position. (minimotorsport.com)

 

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9S6FG4PqMzk]Dakar Day 1 -- Three MINI ALL4 Racing On Top. - YouTube[/ame]

 

Been thinking the same. I saw similar flaps on the WRC cars from time to time last year as well. Big, soft, flappy things aren't they?



... and ugly.



Best guess (and it's a real WAG) is they're up, out of the way and creating less drag when the car is at speed and they're down where they can have an effect when slogging through mud, etc.

 

Stage 4 results for the MINI All4 Racing team: 1st, 4th, 5th, 10th and 11th. As a reference, 136 cars were classified as finishers yesterday on Stage 3.

Not all cars have completed Stage 4 yet so the overall standings aren't available but I think those stage finishes will stand.

More later.