De Baar Brings the Best Czech Truck Dakar’s Finish
17.1.2016
Rosario –The fight is over! 38th year of the world’s toughest rally has come to its end. On Saturday the legendary Dakar finished in the Argentinian town of Rosario. Following two weeks of hard-core racing, it will be the team from the north of the Czech Republic who will celebrate big time, as it is clear now that the best Czech truck in the starting field had been constructed by MKR Technology, based in Židovice. With the Dutch pilot Pascal de Baar behind the wheel the Renault Trucks special achieved a fantastic sixth rank. The champion this year is his fellow countryman Gérard de Rooy.
„The atmosphere is amazing here. We met our goal for this year, making our dream come true. Considering how miserable the beginning was for us, the way the Dakar turned out for us is a bit of a miracle really. Pascal and the team gave excellent performances. I’m extremely proud of all our gang here. This being our second Dakar, I wish for our development to become even better. That’s why ranking in the top ten was our goal for this year, with the final result exceeding our expectations by far,“ said Mario Kress, author and the chief constructor of the MKR Adventure project, glowing with happiness.
Dakar peaked on Saturday with the last, thirteenth, stage from Villa Carlos Paz to Rosario. The crews drove the last seven hundred kilometres out of the total of over nine thousand. The Dutch Stacey was the fastest in the special section, which measured one hundred and eighty kilometres. Pascal de Baar decided for a slower, more tactical racing style, and it paid off. Arriving to the finish on twelfth place, the celebration could break out. He maintained sixth place in the overall ranking, a result that he had not even dreamt off before the race. Originally, he was assigned to support and assist his colleague Martin van den Brink, whose truck burnt down in stage two. Eventually, de Baar took over the leader’s role perfectly. “We’re very happy about it. We were very well aware what happened to us. Moreover, we were not the only ones. Dakar is an extremely unpredictable race and anything can happen here. There’s no certainty for anyone of us. If you’re not lucky, you can hardly succeeed. We were trying to meet our luck halfway and didn’t take any unnecessary risks at the end,“ commented Mario Kress.
The Netherlands have several reasons to celebrate. Apart from the great success by de Baar, the main trophy will travel also to the country of tulips and windmills. Gérard de Rooy managed to win after a four-year break, seizing his second Dakar victory after forty-four hours. He beat the Russian Mardeev on the second by one-hour margin. All in all, the Kamaz trucks had to surrender to other brands this time, with only two of the formerly dominating Russian machines making it to the elite ten.
Not even the rest of the specials to whom the North-Bohemian team provided engines and technical support got lost from the track, including Arthur Ardavichus of the Bonver Dakar Project on a tight eleventh place, his team-mate Tomáš Vrátný on sixteenth and Andorra’s pilot Albert Llovera on thirty-fifth. The latter was the first handicapped pilot to have ever finished the Dakar Rally, despite turning his Tatra over in the penultimate stage and spending the night in dunes, after which he almost did not manage to start in time in the last stage. “We witnessed many situations that were simply hard to believe. We all contributed to this year’s Dakar’s scenario, which was extremely captivating. Above all, I’m glad that we are all safe and sound at the finish and that we managed to obtain valuable experience as well as information and data, so that we can improve even more for the next year. But now, let’s celebrate!“ concluded the smiling Mario Kress.
