2012 Dakar Rally: The Winners & The Losers

Whilst your humble Car Throttle author is keen to show-off his motoring madness via a late entry into the Mongol Rally this year, chances are it won't have anything on the mighty Dakar. In fact, multiply the "sissy" journey of London to Asia in a small banger by the rough factor of one hundred, and you still won't be close to imagining the sheer terror, excitement and energy that the Dakar Rally shoves in your face with abundance.

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The Dakar Rally 2012 was a tad misleading by name this year, and has been since 2008. Participants do not race from Paris, France to Dakar, Senegal due to continued high security threats in Mauritania. Instead, they are treated to some of the roughest terrain known to man by motoring from Argentina across the Andes to Chile and Peru with the finish line set in Lima.

A brief primer for Dakar newbies: racers compete in four vehicle classes - motorbike, quadbike, car and truck - and race a grand total of 9,000km separated into daily stages of 800-900km per day. It's a gruelling 15 day stint of pedal-to-the-floor driving and drivers must keep their wits about them if they're to succeed in a brutal punch-up against unforgiving terrain.

The euphoric winners this year were Cyril Despres and Stephane Peterhanse; Cyril winning first place on a 450cc KTM motorbike and Stephane who was victorious in the car group arriving home in a heavily modded Mini Countryman.

The undoubted loser was Marc Coma who was 2011 winner and who seemed to be cruising to victory until a broken gearbox on the final stage ruled him out of contention.

Make sure you go and check the images and videos, with thanks to some awesome event coverage and gold medal-winning sponsorship by Red Bull and their official Dakar site, and keep your eyes and ears peeled for Dakar 2013. And when we decide to man up, maybe you can join us for the inevitable Team CT Mongol Run. But don't hold your breath!

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