The story of how the original Paris-Dakar rally came to be involves a lot of bikes, a lot of sand, some crazy men and a near-death experience — the stuff that makes the Dakar the spectacle it is to this day.
It all began when a man named Thierry Sabine and some buddies of his decided to take part in the Coast to Coast race in Africa in 1977. But en route, Thierry got lost in the sands of the Tenere desert and was stranded, with no food and no water in the infinite sands. It was after three days and three nights that he was located, alive, and was rescued. However, all those hours alone in the sands gave him an idea — to create his own race in that very desert, and he vowed to do it if he made it out of his predicament alive.
Sure enough, in December 1978, a total of 182 of vehicles turned up to take part in his epic 10,000km race in to the African unknown. Only 74 made it to the finish, with Cyril Despres on his Yamaha 500 XT emerging victorious. And with that, the legend of the Dakar was born. In 1983, Sabine took the Paris-Dakar rally back to the sands of the Terene and once again, the desert had its way with the riders. No less than 40 drivers were lost in a sandstorm, with them taking over four days to get their bearings again. The Dakar was notorious, with crashes and deaths being a part and parcel of the rally.
But in 1986, the rally claimed the life of the man who’d created it. A sandstorm sent Theirry Sabine’s helicopter crashing in to a sand dune and claimed the lives of all those on board. Over the years, the rally continued to be organised between Paris in France and Dakar in Senegal with minor changes in routes and with its reputation as the toughest motorsport event on the planet growing immensely.
The 2008 edition saw a massive shaking up in the rally. The threat of a terrorist attacked forced the organisers to cancel the rally at the last moment. And since then, citing the safety of the rally as the reason, the rally was shifted from Europe and Africa to the continent of South America. It may not go to the city of Dakar anymore, but the name stuck and the Dakar rally still is the toughest motorsport race in the world. It hasn’t been kind to those taking part though — it has claimed over 50 lives since its inception, the number of injuries aren’t even recorded, and crashes are an everyday affair. But year after year, people come back — all crazy men and women on their bikes, cars, trucks and quads — to conquer the beast that the Dakar is.