After being one of many high Truck racers on the Dakar Rally through the 2000s and 2010s, Hans Stacey is enthusiastic about heading again in a automobile. The Dutchman spent Thursday in southern France, the place he examined an Audi Quattro ready by Audi Sport Veghel to hopefully compete within the 2025 Dakar Basic.
“The primary shakedown of my Dakar Audi Quattro in South France for Dakar 2025 went properly,” wrote Stacey. “After all, we nonetheless have some issues to regulate and enhance.”
In 2007, Stacey gained the ultimate Dakar Rally to run alongside the unique Europe to Senegal route within the Truck class, scoring 5 stage wins in a TGA 18.531BB. He made his début in a DAF in 2004 earlier than switching to MAN the next 12 months, and completed second within the 2006 version. Stacey stays the newest Dakar Truck champion who didn’t race for KAMAZ or IVECO as of 2024.
The 2008 Dakar was cancelled and a substitute occasion dubbed the Central Europe Rally took its place for that 12 months, the place he gained six phases en route to a different Truck total victory. After taking two years off, he returned to the race in an IVECO in 2012 and completed second. His most up-to-date Dakar was a ninth-place effort in 2017.
Stacey hoped to race in 2022 with Staff de Rooy, however was changed by Victor Versteijnen for medical causes.
Audi Sport Veghel is a Dutch firm that builds Group B-style Audi Quattros. Though primarily related to rallying and hillclimbing, it’s eligible to compete within the Dakar Basic, a navigation-based companion occasion to the Dakar Rally for automobiles constructed earlier than 1999. One of the well-known examples of a Quattro rally raider got here in 1986 when Franco de Paoli raced the 1986 Paris–Dakar Rally in one which used the chassis and engine of a Vary Rover. Whereas it didn’t end and by no means raced at Dakar once more, Franco later produced comparable fashions for purchasers.
No Audis raced the 2024 Dakar Basic in January.
