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 | Dakar 2010: The Chileans to the Rescue of Team Dessoude.
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Day after day, kilometre after kilometre, the retirements continue to increase, but the French Dessoude Boys are still going strong. The spectators have returned to cheer on the competitors, which turned out to be a very good thing for Frédéric Chavigny. Frédéric, who was driving at low speed, was caught out by a reverse camber and went off the track: "We really don’t understand it, and we didn’t see anything! We didn’t even have time to be scared! The car slid and landed on its side, stuck at the bottom. I just had time to switch off the engine when around fifty spectators appeared and literaly carried the car and put it back on the track! We didn’t even have time to get out of the cockpit, we restarted right away."
The accident was shown at the start of the main evening news at 8 pm on France 2... Not something you can keep secret. But luckily the car is going perfectly, even if its aerodynamics have been slightly altered. "I tried to make a open-top version but Jean Brucy and I aren’t quite good enough with the bodywork" laughed Chavigny. "Unfortunately, the mechanics are going to have a lot of work tonight."
André Dessoude could breathe again, the Pathfinders are still in the race, as is Great Wall - the Dessoude clan is beginning to believe they can make it.
Jean-Pierre Strugo and Yves Ferri are continuing their ‘pleasure drive’, finishing 29th in the special stage - so quite a dynamic pace: "A fine stage in terms of driving today, with, at last, fewer rocks and less sand. The scenery changed, we are no longer in the desert, and the landscape looks more like a Californian baja. We are going carefully and hope to see Buenos Aires from the top of the Andes tomorrow afternoon."
Sylvain Doucet and Yong Zhou are very busy this evening as the importers of the Great Wall in Chile have come to visit Team Dessoude, who are therefore learning to speak some Chinese. Almost a quiet day today: "We pushed really hard but after 100 kilometres we had some power steering problems. The cars are really shaken on these tracks and the end of the rally is difficult. Yong had to finish the stage with his own strength - it was winding and like a trial stage in the wadi, so he had a good workout."
2010/01/13 | 13:38 CET | Editor: MR/HS/L.Arpizou
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