2023-07-03 07:00:00
At Renault, the tasks are distributed precisely. Alpine stands for motorsport, Renault for high mobility and the Romanian offshoot Dacia for inexpensive vehicles without superfluous equipment. But now Dacia is rolling onto the big motorsport stage and will compete in the Dakar Rally in two years’ time – to “win”, according to Dacia boss Denis Le Vot in Paris.
The man does not lack self-confidence. “Dacia is the brand of the era,” explains the Frenchman, who is also “cool”. “In times when new regulations and rising raw material prices are making cars more and more expensive, we have remained true to ourselves and offer the best possible price-performance ratio.” When the brand starts in the Saudi Arabian desert in 2025, the two rally prototypes will be powered by synthetic E -Fuels to be on the go. “For us, the Dakar is also a technological laboratory when it comes to new drives and chassis as well as decarbonized fuels.” Dacia is therefore planning to contest the rally with synthetic e-fuels supplied by the Saudi Arabian group Aramco. From 2025 onwards, Dacia will participate as a manufacturer in the six rounds of the World Rally Raid Championship. Before the start of the Dakar, the two rally prototypes will take part in the Rallye du Maroc next year.
As a technical partner for the construction of the “Dakar-Dacia”, the brand is working together with the British specialists from Prodrive, who have worked for Subaru and Aston Martin in the past, among others. It is not yet known who will direct the deployment of the vehicles. In the Renault group, however, Alpine has the most motorsport experience.
While Le Vot is yet to reveal which model will be vying for victory – the Duster, which was relaunched towards the end of the year, or the larger Bigster or a desert version of the Manifesto prototype, might be the options – he presented the two pilots in Paris. In addition to the Spaniard Cristina Gutierrez, who was the first woman following the Dakar winner Jutta Kleinschmidt to win several stages in the rally, the nine-time World Rally Champion Sebastian Loeb will drive the second Dacia. Cristina Gutiérrez, 31, who studied dentistry, won the Extreme E electric racing series together with Loeb last year.
Dacia is no newcomer to the Dakar Rally. The Duster started in 2013 at the event that was then held in South America. After a 14th place, two Dusters were used by Renault Argentina the following year. A V8 was used as drive, which made 380 hp. At the time, the technical competition manager at Renault Sport Technologies, Christophe Chapelain, gave the Duster good marks. “The performance and reliability were very good. That puts us in a positive mood for further Dakar starts.” At that time, the Duster was still on the road with the Renault trademark. That will now change with the official factory deployment. (cen/ww)
1691651368
#Dacia #ventures #desert
