With the technical and administrative tests completed the team can now look forward to a New Year’s Day morning of final preparations before the event’s curtain-raiser takes place on the January 2.
The Dakar Rally is all set to begin. Team HRC too. The riders, mechanics, technical crew and the Honda CRF450 RALLY bikes have made it through the official race scrutineering and the action can now begin. It took a whole morning to get HRC riders Joan Barreda, Paulo Gonçalves, Michael Metge, Paolo Ceci and Ricky Brabec through the obligatory technical and administrative checks before getting the official go-ahead to embark on the great rally odyssey.
Ahead lie two weeks of tough competition. Competitors can expect a looping 9000 kilometre circuit that starts and finishes in Rosario, Argentina, taking in Bolivia on the way, plus the 300 kilometres of prologue that gets the show underway on 2nd January. Before we know the winner of the Dakar 2016 in two weeks time, the 143 riders in the bike section will have been forced to endure a 4,684 kilometre test of speed, skill, riding dexterity and, above all, navigational prowess.
The prologue stage gets the event off and running from Buenos Aires’ Tecnopolis complex with a special stage against the clock in the Baradero area. The whole race route is, of course, already mapped out and scheduled, but heavy rain has recently wreaked havoc in the northern region of Argentina. This could lead race authorities to make some amendments to the planned route.
Taichi Honda
I’m very happy to be out here with the team. We have done some really good preparation for the Dakar 2016. Everything is ready for the race: bikes and riders. We arrive here in really great conditions and all that is left is to wish the team the best of luck and hope that they get a good result.
Private: Martino Bianchi
With just a couple of days to go before the start of the Dakar 2016, the race is here and you can really feel it. This is the event that Team HRC have been preparing for all year long: riders, bikes and team. We are ready and the whole team is prepared and we hope to be able to achieve our goal. Let’s hope that all team members have a safe race too. Enjoy the race and keep supporting our Team HRC riders.
Private: Wolfgang Fischer
Everyone in Team HRC arrived well in Buenos Aires. The last two days we have spent making the final preparations to our material. Bikes and set-up. Now we are ready to take the final step. The administrative checks and scrutineering have been passed and now we can rest a little with the bikes staying in the parc ferme until the starting ramp. From that point on we will have 300 km to the first bivouac in Rosario. There is a little warm-up, called the prologue, of about 11 km to define the starting positions for the first full stage of the Dakar 2016 from Rosario to Villa Carlos Paz. We are looking forward to an exciting race and everyone is fit and prepared and we can’t wait to get on the bikes and get into the race.
Location Information
The greatest and toughest rally in the world, the Dakar’s history has been written in the heart of some of the world’s most stunning deserts and belongs to the world of the greatest sporting challenges of our time. Both a motor race and an orienteering challenge, the Dakar Rally pits… read more.
Lima, Perú - View in Google Maps
