The Toyota Cooper Tire team claimed second place in the T2 production car class at this year’s Dakar Rally. Dakar veteran driver Xavier Foj and co-driver Pablo Jaton overcame a faulty ECU unit; a day spent digging themselves out of the sand dunes; and an encounter with a massive rock in a river, which almost destroyed their car’s rear differential, to finish on the podium at the rally’s conclusion.
The Toyota Cooper Tire team of Xavier Foj and co-driver, Pablo Jaton, is holding a podium position in the Dakar Rally as the legendary event enters its second half. The 32nd running of the Dakar, famed for being the toughest off-road challenge in the world, started on New Year’s Day and will come to a close on January 17, having covered thousands of kilometres through Argentina and Chile. Spanish Dakar veteran, Foj, and his Argentine co-driver are racing a Toyota Land Cruiser KXR, shod with Cooper’s rugged Discoverer STT rubber.
Cooper Tire Europe will compete in next year’s Dakar Rally after sealing an agreement with Dakar veteran, Spaniard Xavier Foj. Along with co-driver, Argentine Pablo Jaton, Foj will compete in a Toyota Cooper Tire team Land Cruiser KXR built by Jaton’s brother. The rubber of choice for the arduous 9000 kilometre event is to Cooper’s rugged Discoverer STT.
Bridgestone backed drivers Bruce Garland and Harry Suzuki have raced to respectable result in the 2009 Australasian Safari, securing third place overall after 3,500 gruelling kilometres through Western Australia’s outback. Garland and Suzuki, who also have an 11th outright to their credit in this year's Dakar Rally, drove their Isuzu D-MAX to a top three slot after a successful appeal against a two-hour time penalty.
Evo Corse has released its ‘Dakar’ wheel into the aftermarket. According to the company, the 16 x 7-inch wheel has also proven its worth on the Land Rovers of the British Army in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Each wheel is low pressure cast in a permanent steel mould from A356 Primary aluminium alloy, before being receiving a T6 heat treatment to avoid imperfections. The wheels are then CNC machined both front and rear to get the precise spoke profile and to eliminate any possible imbalance. The Dakar is specified up to a load index of 1500kg per corner, meaning that light armoured applications and full loads are both safely within Evo Corse’s stringent design criteria.
The Pikes Peak International Hill Climb is arguably the world’s best-known hill climb event, and in 2009 Yokohama Rubber is fielding an electric vehicle in the event. The company’s Team Geolandar off-road racing team will race to the 4,301-metre summit on July 19 in a self-created vehicle equipped with Geolandar H/T-S tyres.
The Japanese manufacturer refers to the Colorado, USA based event as the “Yokohama Team Geolandar EV Off-Road Challenge,” and states its aim in participating is to contribute towards meeting its environmental responsibilities. In this instance Yokohama wishes to promote awareness of the current and future potential of electric vehicles and gain real world experience to help it develop electric vehicle tyres suitable for use in severe off-road conditions.
Kings Road Tyres, in conjunction with Michelin, has helped a team of British explorers carry out an unlikely journey from London to Timbuktu – not by plane or train, but by flying car. The Parajet Skycar is a road legal version of an off road buggy that can be set up to either drive wheels when on the road or power a rear mounted propeller when it takes to the skies. In flight a large fabric wing gives the Skycar lift whilst the propeller provides the necessary forward thrust.
The Parajet Skycar set off from London at the end of January and travelled down through France and Spain before flying the Straits of Gibraltar to Morocco in North Africa. From Morocco the team travelled through the disputed lands of Western Sahara, into Mauritania and across the Sahara to Timbuktu in Mali.
While the Japanese tyre marque Yokohama is mainly known for its high performance road, race and rally tyres, the manufacturer also produces a large range of tyres for the off-road and SUV market. The latest crop of SUVs as well as genuine off-roaders includes the ADVAN ST and Sport – part of the manufacturer’s flagship range – the Parada Spec X for the tuner market, and the Geolander range, designed for everything from on-road and light off-road to “hardcore” OTR usage.
The UK distributor, Yokohama HPT has recently introduced several new sizes across all ranges and now lists a further eight sizes for the Geolander A/T-S from 15” to 20”, four for the Prada SpecX from 20” to 24” and four for the ADVAN Sport XL from 17” to 21”. The M/T+ is available from 15” to 17”, allowing the off-road market to fit larger tyres than traditionally possible while the H/T-S ranges from 15” to 18” and the ADVAN ST, from 17” to 24”.
Although the event Kumho’s 18-inch Rally Raid tyre was developed for – the 2008 Lisbon-Dakar Rally – was ultimately cancelled, the tyre has since achieved success in a number of other competitive domains. And these victories are also in a way a victory for the Korean manufacturer, as no other tyre manufacturer produces an equivalent cover in this size. According to Kumho, the monster tyre with its enormous tread blocks is designed for optimum pace and durability over the sand and rock conditions that prevail on the world’s top Rally Raids. It employs the ultra-tough synthetic fibre ‘aramid’ (short for aromatic polyamide) in its construction for optimum weight and strength.
Robby Gordon achieved the impressive feat of taking his independent Team Dakar USA to the top of the Open category and third place overall in the 2009 Dakar Rally, beating off challenges from several manufacturer teams. In gaining third place, his was also the fastest two wheel drive vehicle on show.
Gordon uses 37×13.5R17 open Country M/T tires on his Monster Energy H3 Hummer. Despite an increased restrictor plate, his H3 Hummer was able to keep up with the factory cars in all but the very fastest sections, something that the grip qualities of the Toyo rubber contributed towards, says the manufacturer. Gordon and Toyo have vowed to return in 2010 to attempt to reach the top step of the podium, which – considering the millions spent by the works teams – would be some achievement.
Kumho Tires’ motorsport season started off on the right footing following a win at the opening round of the 2009 Irish Tarmac Rally Championship and its highest ever rank at the Dakar Rally.
Eugene Donelly, driving a Skoda equipped with Kumho rally tyres, competed in the A8 class (Over 2000cc, Group A) finishing in first place in the initial round of the Irish Rally, held in Galway on the weekend of 16-18 January. In addition to Donelly, three other vehicles equipped with Kumho rubber ranked first and second in N4 Class (fifth and sixth overall), and first in A7 Class (seventh overall) among 139 vehicles.
Pirelli reports that its Dakar Rally debut as a supplier to the official KTM factory teams was nothing short of dominating, with the new Scorpion Rally tyre, fitted to bikes ridden by Marc Coma and Cyril Despres, capturing the 1st and 2nd positions on the podium. This Pirelli off-road rally tyre was developed together with KTM in preparation for this year’s Dakar. Out of a field of 235 riders, seven riders chose to receive support from Pirelli and out of these seven, three riders finished in the top seven positions overall. KTM Repsol rider Marc Coma, from Spain, and Red Bull KTM rider Cyril Despres, from France, were fiercely competitive in this 31st edition of the Dakar, which this year was staged in South America.
Giniel de Villiers has emerged triumphant in the Dakar Rally – the first South African to do so – thus ending Mitsubishi’s seven-year domination of the event. In another first, his VW Touareg was the first diesel-powered car to win the Dakar.
When Japanese drivers Ukyo Katayama and Takuma Aoki get underway in the 2009 Dakar rally, held in South America between January 3 and 18, both men will be driving vehicles fitted with tyres specially developed for the competition. Manufactured by Yokohama Rubber, the rally tyres utilise a new material the company calls “Orange Oil”, a substance also employed in Yokohama’s latest generation eco tyre, the ‘DNA Earth-1’.
Ingersoll Rand, which has been involved in the Dakar rally race for the last three years, will team up with the Euromaster, Mitsubishi and Toyota teams in 2009. It will offer them portable tools, including the new IQv range of impact wrenches. These wrenches can release torques up to 500Nm and will last three times longer than similar products on the market. IQv tools are also lighter and more compact than rival products, says Ingersoll Rand, characteristics particularly appreciated by race competitors.
Ingersoll Rand’s main partner is the Euromaster Team and has provided official team support at Dakar since 2006.
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