After racing a Peugeot 504 Coupé on the 2024 Dakar Basic, Patrice Auzet and his staff will carry a Renault 30 to the 2025 version.
The automobiles are restorations of the R30s that Crew Gitanes fielded for Georges Houel and Jean-Pierre Gabreau on the 1981 Paris–Dakar Rally. Each drivers ended up retiring as a result of a rash of mechanical failures: Houel misplaced the water in his radiator twice and the circuitry shorting out, whereas Gabreau’s automobile suffered an engine failure simply after the Prologue stage and had to purchase a used alternative from an area storage earlier than exiting whereas in Algeria. Houel additionally raced the inaugural Dakar Rally in 1979 and the 1980 editions within the R30, which was later acquired by M’Taich El Fodil for the 1987 race.
As soon as restored, Auzet hopes to color the automobile with a livery modelled after that of the 2 autos. El Fodil had used a zebra-themed design.
At his Dakar Basic debut in 2024, Auzet was the co-driver for François-Xavier Bourgois of their 504 Pininfarina Coupé; Auzet had labored on the automobile as a mechanic in 2023, the place he needed to rebuild the engine after the Prologue and nursed it to the end. The 2024 Basic went much better for each as they completed twenty-second general and gained the H3.A bunch.
The 2024 Dakar Basic, run in assist of the Dakar Rally, spans 3–17 January.
