Gordon Dakar Failure

Baja Racing News Editorial!

The Gordon Dakar failure is an embarrasment to USA Offroad.

Here is a report directly from the African effort:

""The Hummer could still have won stages.
The beginning of the end was a bolt. Then a slight impact at the Achilles heel, the radiator. However, these slight mechanical failures are not what sent Team Dakar USA home at the end of stage 7. A series of circumstances is what ended the race after stage 7. One circumstance being the in race T-4 support also faced issues in the sand at a critical time, leaving the H-3 and crew marooned. In the end logistics what it takes to beat Africa. Africa will beat everyone down, every time at some point. Every car up till this point in the race has faced set backs by the halfway point. Set backs such as being stuck in the sand, wheel hubs failing, roll overs, engine management glitches, multiple tire failures, getting lost and more.
Robby never got stuck, Never had a flat, never ran out of gas. He just never had the support it takes to address small issues in the middle of nowhere in a timely fashion.
What's the fix for next year? Logistics, this can not be under estimated, mainly in the area of on track support. Maybe, another H-3 entered in the race as a T-2, several T-4 trucks, a convoy of H-1s entered in the 4x4 Open class, a convoy of H-3s entered in the T-1 class. All of the above? A phone call to Hummer compatriots Rod and Chad Hall?""

Call Rod and Chad Hall? WTF? This is the last word of millions of dollars, thousands of the best man hours of American technology and the so-called best offroad racer in America?

Really pathetic. Lets sort it out. First, Rod and Chad Hall know enough about offroad for them to reach their Peter-Principle level and stay there. Smart, but its not what's needed in an international competition. Second, Robby is not Flash Gordon. He's "Crash Gordon". He has had enough success to suck off the titi of American corporations that don't know better. The American offroad industry is young and not so smart. With desert racing and now track style, Americans have cut their teeth and are ready to compete. But, with little real competiton, these American mega-teams will get their lunch handed to them around the world. Why?

Because the money stays in big teams in offroad now. Such a gravity of money, restricts the overall growth of the indusrty. Until the $$$ growth expands to include a larger human and technological talent pool, our American offroad competitiveness will sputter. We may be looking at ten to fifteen years, until Americans win Dakar, with an American team.

Third, blaming "logistics and support" for not finishing a majority of the stages of DAKAR is like blaming the ocean if you drown.

Fourth, the crash. First reports said Robby crashed. Then, the team said there was no crash, but, a "radiator issue". Then the word came from the team, "yes, there was an impact into camel grass that caused the radiator failure". Crash, period. In the old days, Baja were races to survive. Now, with incredible mechanical advancements, we are looking Baja in terms of time completed. At least for the BIG teams. DAKAR truly is a survival race. You are judged by your overall picure. Number of stages finished, number of stages placing and ultimately, the podium. Gordon didn't even make the first grade. Total number of stages FINISHED, ACCOMPLISHED, SURVIVED.

Fifth. Stuck, flat & gas. "Never got a flat, never got stuck and never ran out of gas". If this analysis is how desert offroad racing teams are judged and sponsored and awarded, the industry-the offroad business, better dig deep in their pockets, because there are alot of very successful teams out there!

The Gordon team failed American offroad at DAKAR. They even tried to cover up the story. Everyone got lots of press releases from the Gordon Team until that horrible lump of camel grass reached up and took the American offroads team best efforts at the worlds biggest, baddest offroad race. The releases stopped. And so did Americas hopes in Crash Gordon.

By: Gary Newsome, Baja Racing News Editorial!
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