2009 Dakar champion Giniel de Villiers steered his Toyota Hilux to a third-place finish on the car’s Dakar debut. The South African tells us how it was done…
It was an excellent rally for Dirk and myself, for the Toyota Hilux and the entire team we've had behind us the whole way. To come here with a car that had never been tested at the Dakar and finish on the podium is absolutely brilliant.
It was a tough race this year from the start and especially the last few stages we got here in Peru. These last three days were really tricky and definitely proper Dakar stages. We were so fortunately to have a car that ran with no technical problems, in fact we didn’t have one technical issue throughout the entire race.
You’ve got to take your hat off to our mechanics for the work they did because that made my job of driving so much easier. The podium place we finished up with is a testament to the team and the great job they did. It has been an unbelievable effort and I’m so proud of the whole team.
'Our trump card was the reliability of the Toyota Hilux.'
You never go to the Dakar expecting an easy time and the level of difficulty of this year’s race was no different to what we have had to deal with in previous editions. We knew before we started this year’s Dakar that we would not have the same horsepower and torque of the Minis. To be right in amongst a car which has had so much time and money invested in it is a great result for us.
Our trump card was the reliability of the Toyota Hilux because we never had to stop to fix any major problems on any stage of the race. That’s why we are able to finish on the podium. Now I’m already looking forward to next year’s race because the playing field will be a lot more level. Every car will be required to run with the standard engine that we used this year and hopefully it’ll benefit us to be one step ahead of the game.
There’s no doubt that next year we’ll be coming to the race to try and win.
Keep tabs on the rest of Giniel’s 2012 rally season at redbull.com.
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