The first Dakar rally was held in 1979 in exploration of a “world without barriers” and has since brought together annually a mixed bag of adventurers, celebrities and professional drivers seeking the adrenaline rush from pushing themselves and their machines to the limits of their capabilities.
For its 30th anniversary, the rally heads for South America for a 9000km challenge from the Argentinean capital Buenos Aires to Valparaiso in Chile and back, taking on the forbidding Andes and the Atacama desert.
Wyler Genève is the official timekeeper of the Dakar and is contributing to improving the environmental sustainability of the event. The brand has commissioned a broad-based independent scientific study of the Dakar’s environmental impact which will determine the subsequent scope of a “Wyler Genève” prize, to be awarded from 2010, to reward environmental protection endeavours by participants, the organisers or anyone else involved in the Dakar.
By showing the superlative performance and endurance required to win the Dakar, then adding a remarkable consistency to repeat this nine times, Frenchman Stéphane Peterhansel has achieved the status of a legend in the Dakar fraternity.
He secured his first victory on two wheels, riding for Yamaha, at the age of 25 and started an unparalleled winning streak of 6 victories in 8 editions with the same team. In 1999 he switched to the relative comfort of the cars and quickly worked his way up through the field, winning three of the last five editions with Mitsubishi.
Cumulatively, Peterhansel holds one-third of all Dakar victories over a period which, he admits, accounts for “just about half of my existence.”
In 2008 he became the first official brand ambassador of Wyler Genève, the official timekeeper of the Dakar, whose shock-resistant chronograph he puts through its paces on all his rallies.
