A Disappointing End to Robby Gordon’s Dakar Rally Effort

Charlotte, NC (January 7, 2011) – When Team HUMMER departed on their journey to Argentina on December 27th, returning home early defeated was not part of the plan. On Wednesday during Stage 4 of the event, the No. 303 SPEED Energy/Toyo Tires HUMMER was disqualified from the 2011 Dakar Rally. After breaking a wheel bearing in the liaison stage that leads to the special, the No. 303 team was on the clock to repair the damage. With little time to deploy the support vehicles to his aid, the new wheel bearing could not be replaced on the HUMMER in the time allotted to the team, resulting in automatic disqualification.

“Disappointed doesn’t even begin to describe the way I’m feeling right now, not only for me but for everyone involved,” says Gordon. As a driver, Robby knows that he can’t have a successful team without a first-rate support system, sponsors and fans included. “Knowing all the hard work and dedication that was put into this program is what makes our untimely exit from the Dakar Rally a hard pill to swallow,” he continues to say.

“While it may not appear like it due to our performance thus far, countless hours went into this effort. To have a wheel bearing fail is just sickening…a huge, huge disappointment,” Gordon comments. “We run this same wheel bearing on the trophy truck and have put thousands of kilometers on HUMMERs, and we have never had this part fail.” Once the equipment returns from Argentina every part of the HUMMER will be scrutinized to determine what caused the mechanical failure, and preparation for next year’s Rally will commence.

“Since we had an early exit from the Rally, I intend to compete in the Laughlin race next weekend in the trophy truck and conquer another SCORE championship.”


In the meantime, Gordon would like to thank all his fans for the supportive emails, Facebook and Twitter posts. Gordon says, “I’ve got the best sponsors and fans in the world, and I don’t like disappointing them.” Before returning to the US next week, Gordon has decided to continue along the route to support Eliseo Salazar’s effort. He will host a media tomorrow, giving journalists a ride of their life in the HUMMER.

The No. 327 SPEED Energy/Cristal CERO HUMMER, driven by Eliseo Salazar, continues to compete in the rally and is currently in the 56th overall position. SPEED DEMON, Quinn Cody, finished a respectable 13th during stage six of the 2011 Dakar Rally. He is now 12th in the overall standings.

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Thanks for this TOG.
I cant wait to see what the Journalists who get to ride in the Hummer say tomorrow.
If it's anything like the pass I just saw in the desert,  it will be....oops I just shit my self !
RG should bring the Hummer to Daytona and give rides on the beach!

Bad things can happen to the very best of teams.  Here's a small clip about Andy Granatelli who for 2 years had far superior race cars at Indy:

  his most famous entries were his turbine-powered cars in 1967 and 1968. In both years, he endured the excruciating frustration of seeing probable race-winners fail near the end; Joe Leonard's breakdown with 10 laps remaining in 1968 had been topped the previous year when Parnelli Jones, leading comfortably with just three laps to go, suffered the failure of an inexpensive transmission bearing and retired, handing a sure victory to A.J. Foyt.  Both failures were do to inexpensive parts.

 

Very cool they are sending the Hummers back and get them ready for next year.  NEVER GIVE UP!

Maybe through PJ
Lauglin here we come!!!!!! When bad things happen, good things arise.
Finally, the buzz around the bivouac is that Robby Gordon’s disqualification from the rally is a disappointment to the locals. So Robby staged a little publicity stunt at the end of the day. It’s reported that round 7:00PM one of the super-trucks was descending the grade at about 40kmh when all of a sudden there was another noise off to one side. It was the bright orange HUMMER flying down the hill at mach speed. Spectators were dashing off to either side to avoid the mayhem. He got to the bottom, turned it around and proceeded to hill-climb the 2-wheel drive beast back up the mountain. He then went down to the finisher’s area where organizers immediately tore the numbers off the doors and DAKAR markings from the HUMMER.

Source? I've seen this posted a couple of places, but no source cited. It doesn't sound consistent with what was posted on the Toyo Tire Dakar blog.

 

Also, in all the videos I've seen posted here, when Robby makes the speed runs and comes down the dunes, the Dakar number plate is already off of the car, as if they were removed as soon as his DQ was made official.

Thanks!  Last night on verse Robby said he he did not know if he would race next year.  It is great to here otherwise.  I would hate to see him give up.  He is just too fast for that. I remember seeing him in the parker 400 a long time ago. Their was this hug ditch everybody would slam on there brakes for it.  Every time Robby hit it he was foot to the floor you could here the rev limiter as the engined  as it went pop pop pop.  Then he would just blast threw that thing it was great.  I can't what to see him kick some vw and bmw ass next year in the next Dakar.
I agree
Please Robby come back next year to the Dakar. Don't let this get you down don't give up.

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