Race2Recovery readies for 2013 Dakar with Land Rover

The team’s aim of completing one of the toughest tests of man and machine is to raise money for Tedworth House, a rehabilitation centre for injured service personnel.

They’ll travel through Peru, Argentina and Chile across a varied landscape that includes rough boulder fields and sand dunes. The Land Rover-provided training aimed to enhance the crew’s skills in negotiating tricky terrain, dune driving, orienteering, vehicle sympathy and recovery – all vital skills if they’re to successfully complete the Dakar.

The 11 strong team drove eight hours on a south easterly bearing in Land Rover Defenders from Marrakech across the snow-covered Atlas Mountains towards Ouarzazate. From there it was on to Foum Zguid near the Algerian frontier before they headed off-road through rough challenging boulder fields to the edge of the dunes. They camped out overnight, just as Race2Recovery will do during the Dakar, and vehicle checks were performed ahead of the following day.

Off-road expert Mark Cullum who will drive a T4 support truck in the race, led the training session which involved driving across ‘sand seas’ known locally as ‘Ergs’. His extensive personal experience taught the team the way to approach sand dunes, how to identify soft and hard sand and how to recover a car should it become stuck. Lessons including appropriate tyre inflation and deflation according to terrain were also learned.

The training also allowed the injured servicemen to understand how varying temperatures, snow, sand and dust would affect their artificial limbs including hydraulics, knuckles and other moving parts.

Captain Tony Harris, a below-the-knee amputee who will be driving one of the four Defender-based Wildcats in the rally said: “The past few days, together with the earlier training session out here in November, has provided us with knowledge, understanding and most importantly increased confidence to competently negotiate the tough varied terrain we face in January.

Credits: