MINI All4 Racing Wins Dakar 2012
Stéphane Peterhansel has just won Dakar 2012 with MINI ALL4 Racing in Lima, Peru. This is his tenth victory in the Dakar. However it was the first triumph for the MINI ALL4 Racing and the X-raid Team. The team confirmed that the goal has been finally achieved: the first win in the Dakar Rally. In the racing, the MINI ALL4 Racing clearly demonstrated its outstanding potential and reliability. Stéphane Peterhansel who now has got 10 Dakar wins under his belt, said that there was a lot of hard work involved in order this achievement to be possible. But the success story continues because as all the five MINIs ALL4 Racing entered by the team made it to the top 10. Nani Roma (ESP) ad Michel Périn (FRA) impressed by celebrating three special-stage wins and finished runner-up, thus giving the Monster Energy X-raid Team a one-two, in the 2012 Dakar. Meanwhile, Russia's Leonid Novitskiy and his German navigator Andi Schulz won the first special stage. Finishing fourth in the overall rankings represented the well-deserved reward – and the best Dakar result ever secured by a Russian driver in the Dakar's car ranking. In addition, Novitskyi also was the best-place semi-professional driver in the 2012 edition of the event. The fifth Monster Energy X-raid Team pairing, the Portuguese Ricardo Leal dos Santos und Paulo Fiuza, completed the outstanding team success by taking their red MINI ALL4 Racing to eighth position in the overall rankings. The secret behind this great success lies in the mastery of the engineers and mechanics, which obviously did a fantastic job preparing the cars on every single day.
From 2011 to 2012, the number of MINIs All4 Racing contesting the Dakar increased from one to five. In colors of green, yellow, orange, red and red/blue/white they made the desert more colorful and cheerful place. From the very first special stage and throughout the event, the overall lead was held by one of the MINIs ALL4 Racing. Dakar record winner Peterhansel switched to Team x-raid following the 2009 Dakar. Up to that point in time, Mr. Dakar had celebrated 6 motorbike wins (1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1997, 1998) and three on four wheels (2004, 2005, 2007), in the legendary event. Now, with this achievement he added the 10th triumph. Thanks to the approach of consistency and a matured style of driving, Peterhansel avoided getting involved in any major problems and on day three, he took the lead for the second time to defend it until the rally was over.
2012 Dakar Rally - result:
1. S. Peterhansel (FRA) / J.-P. Cottret (FRA) MINI ALL4 Racing – 38h 54m 46s
2. N. Roma (ESP) / M. Périn (FRA) MINI ALL4 Racing – 39h 36m 42s
3. G. De Villiers (RSA) / D. von Zitzewitz (GER) Toyota – 40h 08m 11s
4. Novitskiy (RUS) / A. Schulz (GER) MINI ALL4 Racing – 41h 06m 40s
5. R. Gordon (USA) / J. Campell (USA) Hummer – 41h 11m 39s
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8. R.D. Dos Santos (POR) / P. Fiuza (POR) MINI ALL4 Racing – 43h 58m 04s
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10. K. Holowczyc (POL) / J.-M. Fortin (BEL) MINI ALL4 Racing – 45h 54m 24s
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12. B. Garafulic (CHI) / G. Picard (FRA) BMW X3 CC – 47h 43m 11s
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16. A. Mironenko (RUS) / S.Lebedev (RUS) BMW X3 CC – 51h 46m 38s
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31. S.Schott (GER) / H.Schmidt (GER) BMW X3 CC – 61h 33m 33s
Source: MINI
