Mini The Maxi At The 2015 Le Dakar; Formerly Know As Paris-Dakar Rally

Mini finishes first for the fourth year in a row

By Henny Hemmes
Senior European Editor
January 19, 2014

The 2015 Dakar Rally drew more of my attention than the ones of the past years. In the eighties, I was always a bit jealous of the men – and the few women - who participated in the Rally Paris-Dakar, as it was called until 2009. Then, Dakar moved to South-America.

The adventurous rally was organized for the first time in 1978, but it was not until the summer of 1981 that I knew about its existence. I received a phone call from Christine Beckers, a Belgian female race car driver, who had participated in the 1982 edition of the Rally: “Would you like to establish a female team with me and another driver to participate with a truck in the Paris-Dakar Rally? A truck will be good publicity…”

I did not need to think twice. I knew her from 24 hour racing at Spa-Francorchamps as being an excellent driver. I was going to pursue our Dutch manufacturer DAF for a truck. But we were already too late. Dutchman Jan de Rooy had just closed a deal for his participation.

Then my Dutch National Racing Team decided to be the back up team of the Dutch motor racers. My husband Peter was going to drive the Puch Steyr Pinzgauer, a 6-wheel drive military light truck. But the team did not think it was something for girls….. They were probably right. Their team mate and motor biker Bert Oosterhuis had an accident and died on the stage, even before the chopper of the organizers arrived. Peter was taken at gun point by one of the locals in Mali for some hours and the circumstances overall were quite bad. There were no means of communication or they were forbidden, so we learned of the situation on the Dutch radio two days later.

In 2009, the rally moved to Argentina and Chile and from then on was called ‘The Dakar’. From then on communication was taken to another level with mobile phones, satellite navigation and fast back up cars. The rally may not be as adventurous as in the early eighties, but nevertheless very hard and exiting for the participants, such as my country fellowmen and friends, the Coronel twins. Tom reached the finish this year in his Maxxis Dakar Buggy after 5,661 long and challenging miles.

Nasser Al-Attiyah and Mathieu Baumel in their MINI ALL4 finished first in the world’s toughest rally. It marked the fourth time in a row for the Mini brand, while nine out of the first 10 cars were Mini’s…!

I must say, that it is nice to know the winner. As a member of the FIA-Commission Women in Motorsport (WIM) , I attended the Regional Seminar, organized by the Qatar Motor and Motorcycle Federation in Doha. The day after the meeting we were invited by Nasser Kahlifa Al Attiya, president of the Federation and FIA Vice President in the Middle East, to watch several desert stages of the Qatar International Rally.

There we met also his cousin, Nasser Al-Attiyah and later saw him and his navigator Giovanni Bernacchini finishing first with the Ford Fiesta RRC of their Qatar World Rally Team. In between stages we visited the teams and chatted with the engineers. It was a lovely event. We could watch from the sand dunes and saw the cars pass by very closely. By the way: Ford Fiestas also took second, fourth, fifth and eight places. Not bad either!