Team De Rooy Fails Scrutineering

[Chase 2]

Holy Crap! Could you imagine?? All that time and money and someone screwed up the paperwork?? From Raid Live dot com:

By decision of the sporting officials, the five trucks of Dutch manufactor DAF have not been cleared to start the 28th edition of the Dakar. The crews concerned are: those of: Hans Bekx (502), Gerard De Rooy (n° 504), Jan De Rooy (n° 506), Marcel Van Vliet (n° 523) and Hugo Duisters (n° 529).

According to the officials technical report the competitors of these vehicles don't have the proper documents.

For these reasons, a jury of officials has decided after speaking to the competitors that based on a part of article 25.4 of the rule book as well as the whole of article 25P1 « every vehicle that is not in conformity can't be cleared to start the rally. (decision of the jury of sporting officials) ». Article 25P2 B must also be taken into consideration. This decision was announced to the competitors at 15h20 and they now have an hour to appeal.

[BillRuhls]

It's not like these guys are a lesser known team either. These guys are big. Be interesting to see if they win the appeal.

[klaus]

I like and dislike what I am reading.

Strict enforcement of the rules creates integrity for the provider. Something our race organizations have lost.

If its purely a technicality on some paperwork, then it is unfortunate that a team that puts lots of effort into it wont compete. I am for looking the other way for the sake of sportsman ship and the spirit of racing.

Tough call for the promoter and competitor.

[klaus]

On marathonrally.de it reads that as of 6pm local time the DAF teams are officially a no-go. Five vehicle wont be allowed to compete.

The decision is based on a vehicle rule violation. Hans Bekx as well as Jan De Rooy challenged the decision without outcome "We made changes to the truck in good faith and based on FFSA rules we are in compliance, but the FIA doesn't see it that way"

Starting tomorrow the race is underway starting the first stage in Portugal.

[bufeo]

From a French journalists' web site it looks as though some of the "parts" listed on the DAF paperwork didn't match what was mounted on the trucks. Bummer. Stuff happens.

Seeing this happen to the DAF guys is small comfort to the 6X guys from the B1K. All check stubs - black box = no race.

PS - I hope all the U.S. guys have a great first day tomorrow. This won't be a "Prelude" Day. Let's hope they all finish just where they want to be and have a somewhat-relaxed New Year's Eve.

I'll be up around 0200 AZ time.