Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128241
R e d B u ll KTM D a k a r T r a in in g C a mp S TO RY AND P HOTO S BY M AR K K A RIYA J ust a few m ont hs ago, KTM North America ann oun ced the form at ion o f the U .S .-center ed Red Bull KTM D ak ar Rall y e T eam - th e first full fledged , facto ry-backed squad com prised entirely of A m erican racers to contest the most famous rally in the world . Paul Krause and Larry Roeseler accepted nominations to bec ome the fi rst two riders, and after por ing ov er a mountain of resumes from all ov er the country , team m anager Scot Hard en selected Case y McCoy - who arguably has more rall y experienc e than any oth er active A merican racer ( wi t h five und er h is belt ) - as the team 's third rid er. But Hard en rea lized that to gi ve th e team its best chance for suc cess, the rid er s wo uld have t o d o m o r e than get used t o rid ing h und red s o f miles a da y in th e d es ert - which probably is n o big deal t o an y of th em , anyway. No , Dak ar ha s a personality all its own , and Har den surmised that his tea m wou ld need to be exposed as much as po ss ib le t o all facets of the race th at will run from Ja nua ry 1 t o 18, 2004 , and cov er m ore than 6000 m il es over two continents and seve n co untries . T hus , he aske d form er Dak ar race r and journalis t J immy Lewi s to design a thr e e-d a y " t r ai n i n g ca m p" t h a t would prep ar e t hem for th is uniqu e competition as much as po ssibl e in the limited time availab le. Wh at he came up with packed a lot of riding ( basi cally from Hesperia, Californi a, t o Primm , Nevada, to the Dumont Dunes area south of Death Valley and then retuming to Hesperia ) and even more learning into those th ree days. It did, however, serve its purpose well and was an eye -o pe ne r for McCoy and Roeseler, who have never been (Below) Paul Krause [left) and Casey McCoy try thei r Dakar Rallye practice b ikes in the Dumont Dunes sand as part of KTM's Dakar training camp for its team of three riders. Actual riding was just one component of the camp. 10 NOVEMBER 19,2003· c u e • e n eVIl's to Dakar be fo re (Krause raced it in '98 , fin ish ing 14th). Le arn in g ho w D ak ar navi g at io n wor k s was, of course, a large pa rt of the cam p, whi ch sho u ld be no sur pris e. As Kraus e pointed o u t , " J im my' s done it four or five t imes now in different ralli es and has always been good at it, plus he w as hook ed up wi t h a very elit e [Dak ar ] team [BMW] .. . Eddi e O ri oli was on that team; he 's got, like, 23 Dakars under his belt or something. He could reall y teach [Jimmy) about na vigation . I think all those things Jimmy laid right out on the t able and said, ' Here's how you do it .' It was great. " J im m y and I had ta lke d abo ut some navigation stuff befo re; he told me ways t o d o the na vi gati on , " Krau se contin ue d. " B ut sitting down and ac tually doin g it with him - m arkin g up the road book and doing it the way he said to do it - help ed tr em en d ou sly . Th e w ho l e concept o f the 'c ap ' [roughl y , wh at the French call a compass head ing) and how to follow it and make sur e th ose are th e direc tio ns you're headed was huge! It's all ver y simpl e stu ff [ in th eory and as presented in th e first night's seminar] , but to apply it made it all ma ke so mu ch m ore sense; it makes it m uch m ore cl ear.