Strong Mini trio out to defend Dakar Rally title

Spain’s Carlos Sainz heads a formidable Mini trio as he bids to defend his Dakar Rally title when the gruelling 10-stage race, being hosted for the first time by a single country, gets under way in earnest with stage one on Monday.

Sainz will drive for the Xraid Mini John Cooper Works Buggy Team which also features Frenchmen Stephane Peterhansel and Cyril Despres, legends on the world’s toughest rally race.

The trio have a remarkable 20 Dakar victories between them, Peterhansel having won six times on the motorbike and seven times in a car, while Despres is a five-time motorbike winner and Sainz also claimed victory in 2010.

“Honestly, I haven’t changed the way I prepare after winning last year,” Sainz, 56, also twice a World Rally champion (1990, 1992), said.

“Once you have won, all you want to do is come back and win again.”

Mini look set to be best tested by Toyota, with Qatari Nasser al-Attiyah, a double Dakar winner (2011, 2015), no doubt looking forward to the sandheavy rally.

Attiyah finished second last year and will be bolstered by teammate Giniel de Villiers, the South African who claimed the Dakar title in 2009 and has had seven other podium finishes including third in 2018.

Nine-time World Rally champion Sebastien Loeb also returns for the fourth time, hoping to become the first privateer to win the Dakar Rally since Jean-Louis Schlesser back in 2000.

Loeb, driving a Peugeot 3008 prepared and fielded by private team PH-Sport, has previously made his mark with a total of 10 stage victories and a second-place finish in 2017.

Since the race switched from its original route from Paris to Dakar for security reasons in 2009, it has had several hosts in South America.

But this year Argentina, Chile and Bolivia all pulled out for economic reasons, leaving Peru the sole host of the 41st edition. –