Dakar, two Ligurians also competing at the car and motorbike rally. The 46th edition has 738 competitors and starts from the Red Sea

Genoa – At the starting line of the 46th edition of the “Dakar”, which starts this morning 5 January, there are also two Ligurians, now viscerally fond of the most fascinating and challenging car and motorbike rally in the world. This is Maurizio Gerini, a 38-year-old from Chiusanico, still navigator of the Spanish Laia Sanz on the Astara O2 C buggyonceptand the 62-year-old Luciano Carcheri from Dianette, competing with the Turin navigator Fabrizia Pons on a 1999 Isuzu Vehicross.

Gerini, after a career full of successes in cross and enduro (two Italian titles and one European vice champion) has taken the path of Motorally. He won the Transanatolia, came close to winning the “Africa Eco Race” and is now experiencing his seventh “Dakar”, the third in a car after four on a motorbike. They race with the number 238 in a ch carand the team also wants to use it as a laboratory for decarbonisation. The team, which defines itself as “the most sustainable in the Dakar”, aims to demonstrate that it can compete at the highest level with minimal environmental impact and limited resources.

Sanz has 14 trials and 6 enduro world champion titles under her belt. You have participated in the Dakar eleven times on a motorbike (with as many category victories) and two in the car. Gerini and Sanz, who in 2022 had finished in 18th place among the “Legends”, are aiming for the podium in the two-wheel drive category and a placing among the top fifteen in the general category.

In the “Classic” category, two doyens are competing: Luciano Carcheri and Fabrizia Pons (in the past competing in world rallies with the Frenchwoman Michèle Mouton) supported by the Tecnosport team. For Carcheri, first of the Italians in the 2000 edition and third in the motorcycle prototype category, it is the twelfth presence at the “Dakar”.

The “Classic” category (which includes only cars that have made the history of the rally) provides a slightly different route from the other cars, to highlight the true essence of the rally born from the mind of Thierry Sabine. The “Dakar” also involves Matilde Tomagnini, manager of Alassio, project manager of Fantic Motor, for which she takes care of the logistics for the three drivers competing. She is responsible for a team of 13 people, between mechanics, drivers and a physiotherapist. He wanted Gabriele Noberasco from Albenga, president of the historic company that trades fruit, at his side as an assistant.

Liguria has an important role in the “Dakar” also in logistics and transport given that the ships Jolly Palladio and Jolly Titanio of the Genoese shipping group, Ignazio Messina, they set sail from Barcelona for the Saudi port of Yanbu where they unloaded 845 vehicles, 34 containers, 5 platforms with helicopters from the caravan. In Saudi Arabia, with the AlUla-AlUla prologue, the race will start today, the fifth in a row organized in the Middle East, which will end after 12 stages and 7891 km to travel, of which 4727 timed. The 343 entries (72 cars, 42 vehicles in the T3 class, 36 buggies, 46 trucks, 137 motorbikes and 10 quads) for a total of 738 competitors will start from the shores of the Red Sea before challenging the Rub'al Khali desert.

The most notable novelty is the 48 hour superstage which will force the participants to have no assistance from the mechanics and to rest in one of the eight bivouacs positioned along the route, and then set off again the next morning based on the accumulated gap. The only break day is scheduled in Riyadh on January 13th, while the arrival is scheduled in Shaybah on January 19th. —