The Frenchies Take Dakar

After 15 insane stages of rocks, dirt, head, and African desert, the 2007 Dakar rally ended in Senegal on Sunday. One of the largest off-road races in Europe, the Dakar pushes drivers for two weeks as opposed to the weekend rallys we have in the United States.

Even though the U.S. send over Robby Gordon, Michael Petersen, Mark Miller, and a few others, we couldn’t compete with the French. The French? Yes, the French! They took the top 2 spots in the overall and the top 3 spots in the car division. Miller received 4th and Gordon finished 8th, but that was it.

“I was impressed with our performance. We are competing with some of the best WRC drivers in the world and it’s no secret that the Hummer is a Monster compared to the four wheel drive cars of Mitsubishi and Volkswagen. I’m very proud of our whole team.” Nice job guys, but I almost feel that this is like the U.S. basketball team getting third in the Olympics. It’s nice, but we want first.

Socal says: Where are all the other big guns in U.S. off-road racing. Renezeder, Baldwin, McMillan, Adler, and the rest of the Score/CORR racers. This is an insane event with a chance to show the rest of the world that no one races harder off-road than Americans. Props to Gordon and Miller for charging it. Like the Tour DeFrance, maybe it will just take a few years until Americans get serious about it…