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First
stage: Barcelona > Barcelona |
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December 31, 2004 (Friday)
Liaison: 6 km / Super special stage: 4 km / Liaison: 8 km / Total: 18 km |
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| The competitors, who will complete scrutineering by December
30, will battle it out on a specially set short special stage (SS) near Barcelona
on December 31, the day before the rally starts. It was normal practice up until
the start of the 90’s to have a gallery stage before the start of the event, but
at that time the so-called “prolog runs” determined just the starting order for
the first Africa stage. The opening special stage this year, in contrast, is being
run as a “super special” whose times will be added to the competition results
for the first time. While the super special stage is only four kilometers long,
part of it will be along the beach. The organizers have called for competition
drivers to watch out for pitfalls that could damage their vehicles. Many spectators
will flock to watch this stage, which looks certain to attract intense interest.
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Second
stage: Barcelona > Granada |
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January 1, 2005 (Saturday)
Liaison: 919 km / Total: 919 km |
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| The starting ceremony will be held from 10 a.m. on New
Year’s Day and all the competitors will be introduced on a podium erected in Barcelona’s
Placa de Espagna. The motorcyclists will start in reverse order of their vehicle
numbers, while the four-wheel vehicles and camion trucks will start in order of
their numbers. As last year, the start will be at midday but this time there will
be no competition stage, and the Granada stage will be a liaison stage only. The
route to just before Granada will be nearly all motorway. A checkpoint will be
set up on the way at Castellon, and lunch will be provided for competitors. Motorcycles
will not be permitted to be carried on support vehicles or towed in trailers.
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Third
stage: Granada > Rabat |
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January 2, 2005 (Sunday)
Liaison: 6 km / Special stage: 10 km / Liaison: 507 km / Total: 523 km |
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| Soon after leaving Granada the competitors will enter
the 10-km special stage set up on a nearby military base. This is expected to
be, as in past years, a combination of a forestry road and a twisty section developed
with graders within the airfield grounds. This is clay country, and as considerable
rain falls at that time of the year, the road is expected to be very slippery.
In the past many competition cars have overturned or crashed and been severely
damaged before even making it to Africa, so caution will be needed. The starting
order for this special stage will be determined by the results of the super special
stage raced in Barcelona on December 31. The motorcyclists will start in reverse
order of those results. After this, a liaison stage of approximately 500 kilometers
will take the vehicles to the port of Algeciras at the tip of the Gibraltar Strait.
They will cross the strait by ferry and make landfall in Africa at Tangier in
Morocco, then travel down the motorway to Rabat, where they will arrive in the
middle of the night. This will be a very hard day, and will mark the fourth time
the rally has bivouacked in Rabat, the capital of Morocco (the other times were
1994, 1999, and 2002). |
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Fourth
stage: Rabat > Agadir |
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January 3, 2005 (Monday)
Liaison: 122 km / Special stage: 123 km / Liaison: 421 km / Total: 666 km |
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| The first competition leg in Africa will be 123 kilometers
long, starting from the outskirts of Rabat. Seventy percent of this will be new
course. The first half will pass through very hilly cork oak forest, while the
second half will traverse country with very few landmarks and there will be frequent
changes of direction. Navigation in this second half will be challenging and even
veteran teams are highly likely to experience time loss. After the special stage
goal has been reached, the vehicles will continue on a 430-kilometer liaison stage
all on sealed roads until they reach the bivouac at Agadir on the Atlantic Coast.
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Fifth
stage: Agadir > Smara |
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January 4, 2005 (Tuesday)
Liaison: 240 km / Special stage: 381 km / Liaison: 33 km / Total: 654 km |
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| After a sealed road liaison stage to Guelmin, the first
special long stage and the real start of the Dakar Rally will finally begin. The
section through the hills at the beginning will be fast, but the road will quickly
become rocky and the pace will slow. After that, the course will be a winding
(unsealed) mountain trail where high-speed sections will alternate with low-speed
sections until the route finally ends in a very long dry lake. After that, the
course will be completely new. From around this day, time differences between
the competitors will steadily open up. Smara, the bivouac for this day, is one
of the main towns of the western Sahara region. |
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Sixth
stage: Smara > Zouérat |
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January 5, 2005 (Wednesday)
Liaison: 121 km / Special stage: 492 km / Liaison: 9 km / Total: 654 km |
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| On this day, the competitors will step onto the main stage
of the 2005 rally — Mauritania. This is also the first genuinely long special
stage, and in this year’s rally, with its fewer days of competition, it is expected
to be difficult from the start. After a 120-kilometer liaison, which will follow
the same route to the border as last year, the special stage will start immediately
after the vehicles cross into Mauritania. The opening section — an area around
the border that includes the risk of landmines — is flat and sandy, but after
that the drivers will wind their way among dunes. The first part should be the
same as the Tan-Tan - Atâr special stage used in 2004, while the second part will
probably veer westward as it heads for Zouérat. (The 1996 rally also included a
Smara - Zouérat special stage.) While this will be a high-speed stage overall,
there will probably also be difficult dunes around Zouérat to negotiate. Because
the assistance vehicles will follow the special stage for the first 100 kilometers
(probably up to Bir Mogrein), they will start after the competition vehicles and
consequently arrive at Zouérat quite late. |
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Seventh
stage: Zouérat > Tichit |
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January 6, 2005 (Thursday)
Liaison: 9 km / Special stage: 660 km / Total: 669 km |
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| This course, which will start from the mining town of
Zouérat and cross the Mauritania desert to Tichit, is a virgin route for the Dakar
Rally. In addition, Tichit is a “marathon bivouac” with no assistance team, which
means that after refueling the competition vehicles must quickly be sequestered
in the parc-ferme. As a result, any damage or trouble the vehicles experience
on this leg can greatly affect the outcome of the competition. At 660 kilometers,
this is the longest special stage on the rally and looks like being one of the
major hurdles of the first half of the event. The special stage starting point
just outside Zouérat is flat and the motorcyclists will start together in batches
of 20. After that, the road remains flat with dunes here and there until the Ouararda
Pass, which is flanked by two cliffs. The second half beyond the pass is a succession
of small dunes followed by a final 100 kilometers of sandy hills with a thick
covering of camel grass right up to Tichit. The second half of this stage, in
particular, will have low average speeds and the crews will no doubt be extremely
exhausted. |
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Eighth
stage: Tichit > Tidjikja |
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January 7, 2005 (Friday)
Special stage: 520 km / Liaison: 18 km / Total: 538 km |
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| This will be the second day of the “marathon course” raced
with no back-up. The vehicles must start in the same condition they finished the
day before. The unsealed roads between Tichit and Tidjikja connect the two towns
in a direct line east-west, and the 2004 rally also passed through here on its
Tidjikja - Nema stage. This year, though, the route will pass to the south of
last year’s. The organizers have dubbed this “the ultimate stage,” a proud combination
of all the special stage elements. The first half, in particular, is a difficult
series of dunes. After the famous Nega Pass, the second half is rocky mountain
trails. At the Tidjikja bivouac the competitors will meet up again with their
assistance teams, which will head directly there from Zouérat via Atâr. |
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Ninth
stage: Tidjikja > Atâr |
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January 8, 2005 (Saturday)
Liaison: 3 km / Special stage: 361 km / Liaison: 35 km / Total: 399 km |
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| This is a reversal of the Atâr – Tidjikja route of the
2004 rally, and halfway through will deviate to veer north to reach Atâr via Chinguetti.
The first half will be high speed but the challenge of the second half will be
the cluster of large dunes around Chinguetti. The organizers explain that they
have set the course so that amateur competitors can reach the bivouac as quickly
as possible, but the difficulty posed by the dunes is high, and there will be
no room for complacency. |
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Rest
Day |
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| January 9, 2005 (Sunday) Atâr |
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| The center of the Adrar region, Atâr was founded by a Chinguetti
tribe in the 17th century. From the airstrip used as the bivouac, a ring of black,
rocky table-top mountains can be seen in the distance. Connected to the capital
Nouakchott by sealed road, regular flights operate out of Atâr and it has a tourist
hotel. Atâr is often used as a bivouac on Dakar rallies, but it has been three
years (2002 was the last time) since it was last used for a rest day. |
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Tenth
stage: Atâr > Atâr |
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January 10, 2005 (Monday)
Liaison: 8 km / Special stage: 483 km / Liaison: 8 km / Total: 499 km |
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| The first day of the second half of the rally will be
a loop course based in Atâr. This will be a highly testing stage and one of the
most difficult of the rally. The route will circle clockwise, heading north from
the outskirts of Atâr to a cluster of large dunes, climbing the difficult Thaga
Pass, then passing through dunes again. The route will pass through El Beyyed
quite close to the Zouérat - Tichit route, then go through dunes for another 40
kilometers, but these harbor the most difficult challenge — one that “no competitor
has ever surmounted.” In the second half, the competitors must cross the 200-kilometer
dry lake Sebkhet Chemcham before returning to Atâr. |
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Eleventh
stage: Atâr > Kiffa |
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January 11, 2005 (Tuesday)
Liaison: 34 km / Special stage: 656 km / Liaison: 5 km / Total: 695 km |
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| The route to Kiffa in southern Mauritania will be 656
kilometers long, the second longest stage in this rally. The first half will be
dunes with plenty of camel grass and a detour to the summit of Bou Nega. Part
of the way will follow the 2004 Tidjikja – Nouakchott route in reverse.
This stage should include a series of soft dunes, but further south when the Tagant
massif is reached, the road will change from sand to mountain trail. South from
here, there will be virtually no dunes. Passing through a gully, a rocky road
will lead back to the Nega Pass, then descend to Kiffa. The final 150 kilometers
will be sandy mountain trails but quite fast. |
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Twelfth
stage: Kiffa > Bamako |
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January 12, 2005 (Wednesday)
Liaison: 25 km / Special stage: 586 km / Liaison: 208 km / Total: 819 km |
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| Here, the route will finally turn its back on Mauritania
and enter the African Sahel region. Sand dunes will be replaced by narrow mountain
trails meandering through trees and plants. The special stage will take the competitors
over the border into the Republic of Mali, then through Nioro, which has been
used as a bivouac numerous times. The road will narrow with no forking as it goes
south, and overtaking will become difficult. The route will now pass through many
villages and unless the drivers keep an eye on their speed, they could incur penalties.
There should be a river crossing near the end of the special stage. Bamako will
be the second “marathon bivouac,” and all assistance will banned once
Bamako is reached. |
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Thirteenth
stage: Bamako > Kayes |
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January 13, 2005 (Thursday)
Liaison: 205 km / Special stage: 370 km / Liaison: 93 km / Total: 668 km |
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| This day’s stage will be hard and rocky and there
will be basically no side roads. In this area, it will be difficult to drive competitively
in the face of the dust thrown up by any oncoming vehicles. After the liaison
stage, which will extend for 205 kilometers from the capital Bamako, the special
stage will head off in a westerly direction. The first part will be comparatively
wide mountain roads traversable at high speeds. The course will skim by a dam
on the northern end of Manantali Lake, then enter the Tambaoura Mountains where
it will fork frequently. Finally, the route will reach the goal of Sadiola, a
village known for its gold production. Kayes will be reached via a 93-kilometer
liaison stage. The assistance teams will race directly from Kiffa to here. |
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Fourteenth
stage: Kayes > Tambacounda |
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January 14, 2005 (Friday)
Liaison: 93 km / Special stage: 529 km / Liaison: 8 km / Total: 630 km |
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| This stage will take the competitors from the Republic
of Mali to their final country, Senegal. First will be a liaison stage, in reverse
direction to the previous day’s liaison, and this will take the competitors
back to Sadiola where the special stage will begin. First, the route will go south
along narrow mountain trails, from which the border will be visible on the right.
At the approach to Satadougou, the scenery will change to savannah. From here
the route will continue west, crossing the Faleme River and entering Senegal.
Skimming the edges of the Niokolo-Koba National Park, the route will now be a
mountainous bush trail dotted with villages and will lead to the final bivouac,
Tambacounda. From here, Dakar is about 400 kilometers by sealed road. |
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Fifteenth
stage: Tambacounda > Dakar |
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January 15, 2005 (Saturday)
Liaison: 108 km / Special stage: 225 km / Liaison: 236 km / Total: 569 km |
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| After a roughly 100-kilometer liaison heading west on
a sealed road leading to Dakar, the special stage will begin. The 225-kilometer
course, which is actually the final special stage, is a twisty road through tropical
forest. In the past, camions and other vehicles have had their front windscreens
broken by overhanging branches here. Overtaking on this stretch is accompanied
by considerable risk. After the completion of the special stage, a 236-kilometer
liaison stage will lead to the Meridian President Hotel on the coast near Dakar.
A parking area for the assistance vehicles will be set aside in the hotel carpark
so the vehicles can be prepared for the final goal. |
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Sixteenth
stage: Dakar > Dakar |
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January 16, 2005 (Sunday)
Liaison: 37 km / Special stage: 31 km / Total: 68 km |
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| On the final day, the vehicles will leave the hotel for
a 37-kilometer liaison stage, then drive the 31-kilometer final special stage
along the coast. In keeping with tradition, the motorcyclists will start together
in batches of 20, while the four-wheeled vehicles, including camions, will start
two by two. The goal of this special stage is the rally’s final finish line.
A podium will be set up on the shores of the salty Lake Rose, which is adjacent
to the coast. As the final special stage will also be a competition stage, drivers
cannot afford to relax. Vehicles have been known to get stuck here and competitors
slip several places; in the past some have sadly had to retire. But having said
this, this stage is really a victory run. The first competitors should reach the
finish line around noon. In addition to the prize-giving ceremony to be held at
the podium, all drivers who complete the rally will step up to be congratulated.
This is a scene that promises to be the highlight of the Dakar Rally. |
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