Xu hopes for a breakthrough with new team at Dakar
China's rally driver Xu Lang, who placed 19th at the Dakar Rally in 2004, the highest a Chinese driver has ever placed, expects a breakthrough in next year's Dakar as he joins a new team.
After missing this year's Dakar Rally, Xu announced he would be joining Honghe Team to compete in the Dakar 2008 race. Honghe has won China's national rally championship for five consecutive years, but will compete in Dakar for the first time next year.
"With the Honghe team, I won the national championship, so I know I can communicate well with the team," said Xu, who previously raced with Team Paladin for two years in the Dakar Rally.
China's auto sports officials pointed out that the language barrier is one of the biggest obstacles for Chinese drivers.
"China still has no world-class automobile technicians, so we have to hire from abroad," said Yan Jianchang, president of Federation of Automobile Sports of China.
"Since drivers have to tell their own feelings about the cars, communication is very important," Yan said. "But the language skill of Chinese drivers is always a problem. I hope young racing fans could prepare themselves well with good communication capabilities. They can do well only if they are well prepared."
Xu believes that his two years of experience will also enable him to do well next year.
Honghe Team will send three cars to next year's rally: two in the T1 category and one in the T2. The team's goal is for all three cars to complete the whole rally.
"The first time of experiencing Dakar will be a great challenge for our whole team," said team manager Ma Junkun, who used to be a racer himself. "I hope the Chinese flag will fly from the very beginning to the finishing line."
Xu's teammate is Hua Qingxian, who has no Dakar experience but says he is ready for the challenge.
"I'm very excited to take part in the Dakar Rally and I know it is very challenging," said Hua. "I will try to conquer all the difficulties that we meet on the road and I hope I can complete the whole race."
According to Ma, the team has already started its preparation for the 2008 Dakar Rally, which starts next January. Xu tested his Nissan pickup in August and Hua trained in France last month.
"The car I will drive in next year's Dakar is very powerful, so it will be a little more dangerous," said Xu. "I still need to adapt to the car during the race, but I like this car."
The team will go abroad for special trainings for Dakar in November.
Although the automobile industry has developed rapidly in China in recent years, Chinese drivers still lag behind in the world's top races like Formula One and Dakar.
A total of seven Chinese drivers have competed in the Dakar Rally since 2003 and the best performance was Xu's 19th finish in 2004.
Dakar Rally is the most famous rally race in the world. Europeans call it the "marathon raids" or "rally raids".
(China Daily 10/10/2007 page22)
