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The most colourful and spectacular motor sport event in the Middle East, and it will blaze a brand new trail. The UAE Desert Challenge is ready to launch its 17th edition

Published: Sat 6 Oct 2007, 11:25 AM

Updated: Sun 5 Apr 2015, 12:43 AM

CARLOS SAINZ thought he’d seen everything in a rally driving career spanning three decades and five continents. Until, that is, he came across the UAE Desert Challenge.

Sainz, the two-times former World Rally Champion, was left breathless by the spectacular World Cup event when he made his competitive Middle East debut in the UAE last year.

Exhausted after one particularly demanding special stage time trial in the Empty Quarter, he clambered out of his VW prototype and made straight for the AC-cooled team bus to recover. A very tough day at the office.

Wind forward 12 months and Sainz is preparing to come back for more as the Desert Challenge waits to send a powerful assembly of men, women and machinery on a blazing journey across some of the most dramatic terrain on earth.

More than 120 drivers and riders from across the globe are geared up for this 2,210-km test of endurance which doubles up as the final round of both the FIA World Cup for Cross Country Rallies (cars and trucks) and the FIM Cross Country Rallies World Championship (motor bikes).

It begins with a super special spectator stage — the traditional curtain-raiser — in Dubai on Sunday, October 28 before the battle of the desert begins in earnest the following day.

Among the leading contenders for victory on four wheels is last year’s winner, former world champion downhill skier, Luc Alphand, who will come under pressure from a succession of big name challengers. They include his two Mitsubishi team-mates, fellow-Frenchman and three-times winner Stéphane Peterhansel and Spanish star Joan “Nani” Roma, who would love to make it a 1-2-3 of prototype Pajeros Evolutions.

But as the Desert Challenge has shown so many times in the past, this is an event which can be tough on the favourites, and Sainz is determined to hand Volkswagen a first victory in the UAE. The Spaniard is a close friend and former WRC practice partner of Desert Challenge creator Mohammed Ben Sulayem, who spent years trying to lure him to the UAE. Sainz didn’t disappoint, winning three of the six special stages and might have taken victory but for a second day mechanical disaster.

“We want to attract the best drivers and riders in the world, and give our top competitors from the UAE and other Middle East countries the chance to share an international stage with them,” said Sulayem, President of the Emirates Automobile and Touring Club.

This time Sainz is back with the support of team mates Giniel De Villiers, Carlos Sousa and Dieter Depping who all want to outlast the Mitsubishis. Among the other top foreign challengers aiming to score in the UAE is Brazilian Paulo Nobre, a passionate football fan who is out to make a big impact with the BMW X-Raid team.

Aiming to make sure that the men don’t have things all their own way is Germany lady driver Andrea Mayer, who has proved herself a tough desert challenger over the years. While the world’s top cross country rally drivers fight it out in the desert, the bikes battle will be just as hot.

Reigning world champion David Casteu faces a five-day tussle with last year’s winner, Spain’s Marc Coma, four-times Desert Challenge king Cyril Despres, and a cluster of other top challengers in a line-up of more than 70 riders.

Carrying UAE hopes again, Atif Al Zarouni chases the quads title for the third time

in four years. Hoping to go one better, Rustam Minnikhanov, Prime Minister of the Russian Republic of Tatarstan, aims for a fifth trucks triumph in six years

Most of the action takes place among the towering sand dunes and sabkha plains of the Rub Al Khali, or Empty Quarter, and the event is based for four nights at a desert camp site, or bivouac, at Moreeb Hill, near the Liwa Oasis.

This is a scene of great activity from the early morning start of each special stage right through to darkness which sees mechanics, and often competitors themselves, working long hours to prepare their machines for the next day’s assault.

While Moreeb Hill may be out of reach for all but the avid enthusiast, there are still good opportunities to get a close up view of the powerful assembly of prototype cars, modified four-wheel drive vehicles, bikes and trucks, much closer to home.

All the vehicles go through day-long scrutineering checks at the event’s official HQ, Dubai International Marine Club, Mina Seyahi, on Saturday, October 27, and the public are welcome to carry out their own inspection. At 4.30pm the following day, the super special spectator stage roars to life on a twisting 2km trail beside Al Wasl Road in Dubai, close to the Police College and in the gaze of the Burj Al Arab. At 9.30am the next morning, the event starts officially from the Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi, launching five days of high octane action in the desert.

Five days later, at 4.30pm on Friday afternoon, the trail reaches its conclusion back at Dubai International Marine Club.



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