In January 2012 KTM will be chasing its eleventh consecutive Dakar Rally win. Reigning Dakar champion Marc Coma of Spain heads the AMV Red Bull Team with support from fellow Spaniard Juan Pedrero. Despres will lead the Red Bull Team’s charge for the title together with his ‘water carrier’ Ruben Faria of Portugal. Both Coma and Despres have three Dakar titles to their names and the competition between them has become legend in the sport. All four KTM factory riders will compete on the further developed 450 cc factory rally bike, which made its successful debut in the Dakar Rally in January 2011. Regulations were changed in 2010 to introduce the smaller cubic capacity bike in the hope of breaking KTM’s stranglehold on the title, but the machines from Austria and their two key riders once again rose to the occasion and crossed the line 1-2 when the bikes returned to the finish in Buenos Aires. The Dakar Rally, since 2009 held in South America is universally recognized as the world’s toughest. It involves 17 days of hard riding in immensely challenging geographic conditions for both man and machine.
Johnny Aubert will make his Dakar debut in January
KTM’s Enduro Factory Team rider Johnny Aubert of France will also make his Dakar debut in January 2012 riding a series model KTM 450 Rally bike and supported by KTM’s Service Package as offered to privateer riders. More than half of the competing bikes in the Dakar Rally are KTMs. Aubert is considered one of the best riders in the Enduro World Championships. He is a double world champion and joined the KTM Factory Team in 2010. Johnny was unable to ride in the second half of the 2011 season following injuries at the GP of Greece but is now fully recovered and in training for the Dakar challenge.
KTM Dakar Rally Launch:
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