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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128241
(Above) The most thorough instructions at Dakar will be provided in French; the English translations tend to be condensed, though the road books will use abbreviations and symbols that make the most sense to native French speakers. ThUS, It's necessary to become familiar with a key to those symbols and abbreviations, as Roeseler Is doing here. (Above) The three amlgos - (from left) Paul Krause, Larry Roesele r and Casey McCoy - gather 'ro und the 950 racer. (Ri ght) Training camp director Jimmy Lewis conducted a very useful and informative seminar on Dakar navigation, strategies and other helpful tips at the end of the first da y - similar to when the Dakar riders would get informati on on the fo llowing day's course. (Bel ow ) (From leftl Roeseler, Lewis, Krause and McCoy review GPS setup; In Dakar, competitors are Iss ue d pre-programmed GPS units so Lewis made sure that the three practice units were set to show displays similar to what would be issued. "I wouldn't say it makes navigation easy , because trying to race, trying to control a motorcycle and go fast at th e same t ime yo u're doing all those other t hi ngs is jus t going to take some practice and getting used to." Sin c e he was recovering from a pract ice-ride getoff a few days before, Roeseler didn 't part ici pate in the ridi ng portions of the ca mp , b u t h e abso rbed as m uch as he could in the re m a ind e r and found it extremely h elp fu l. Reg ardin g navigation , L. R. said, " [Previously] I thoug ht the GPS j ust pointed an a rrow, an d you just wen t tha t d irec t ion . I thought it was as sim ple as th at , but it' s not as sim pl e as that!" Krause's m echanic , Gavin Sk ilton, a 20 00 Da k ar Rally e part icipant in hi s b roth er ' s ca r t eam , adde d , "It' s really funny , b ecau se mos t p eop le th at I t alk to that ha v e pla yed with GPS and things go, ' O h , thes e ar e th e gr eat e st thing s in th e wo r l d! They 're fant astic!' "Yo u don' t get to race [D akar] with a GPS an d a to p o jq ra p h ic a l] ma p wi th a line drawn o n it ; tha t's not how it wo rk s. You really hav e to wor k all the instruments an d all the inform at i o n given to you at all ti mes. You can never rely on one t h ing on its own ; yo u' re constantly working between all of them. That' s the hard thing people forget about. You've got to look at your GPS, your odometer and your road book , and just keep them all as tight as yo u can . Because the GPS is the only th in g that's ever on 100 percent - if yo u're lucky. You r o dometer, if yo u short-course, it goes up or down. It's ha rd to keep o n, reall y . If yo u' re not paying atte ntion to that , it can reall y c atc h you in the long run bec au se if yo u don 't do it all the time, you ca n c loc k up a f ew mil es or lose a few miles on your overa ll [od om eter reading]. and it starts to really co nfuse yo u. "Jim my 's ro ad books th at he laid out were all really goo d, all with th e Fr en ch a b brevi at io ns so it r e all y eat a little, sleep a little, have din ner, atte nd riders' m e et in g ] . Lew is also ta ug h t that yo u shouldn 't let your gu ard down whi le in the bivouac for the ni gh t, eve n when there's so much going on throughout the night. As Sk il t on repo rted, "We fired up the m usic late [at] night, we fired up some bikes , started bouncing around with the hammer waking people up . Jimmy Lewis found the boys ' helmets and boots outside their tents so he hid th em in h is truck bec a use he ' s like, ' Hey , it's D ak ar. If you left yo ur stuff outside your tent, it'd all b e gone.' And they ha d to ge t up at fo ur o'clock in th e morning looking f o r their boots and helmets - q uite entert a inin g ! ( T hey r o d e tha t day fro m 4: 4 5 a.m. to 7 p .m .) " J immy was doing it right. If you weren't cussi ng Jimmy by the end of it , he wasn 't doi ng his j ob , so I think the guy s all got a littl e taste for it. You ca n' t be bummed out about anything ; yo u've just got to kee p m oving o n." But no one see med di sappointed . In fact, all appeared to want.m ore, A s Ro esele r sa i d , "I th ought th at wa s very educ atio nal. It g ives m e a better pi cture of it all." I:N made those guys ha ve to think a lot ," Skilto n co ncluded. McCoy admitted, "I was real nervo us when I f irst st arted b ecau se I had never re ally used IGPS]. It was huge; I ca n' t ev en tell you how benefici al tha t tra ining was, esp eciall y tha t ride on We dnes d a y [th e thi rd and fi nal day]. The fi rst thi ng I di d - and I' m glad I did it - was I got los t. Sev en miles o ut, I was , ' What h ave I done wrong here? ' I went bac k and found my bearings a nd everything and looked at it. I reall y found the importance of watchi ng, not so much the GPS but your compass bearing. J ust in that, I think it taught me in that one move , eve ry ti me t here was t hat bea ring t hat J imm y w a s ca ll ing a 'cap,' it's so im po rta nt, I pay atte ntio n to t ha t [no w ] . Th at ri g ht th er e was worth it s weight in gold , realizing tha t and fi gu ring out how to do that. " T hen th ere wer e th e ot he r thing s, li k e n ot relyin g on so meo ne e lse especially a faster rider - to lead you th ro ug h a tr icky sectio n bec au se he migh t b e t ak ing the w rong way in or de r to get you lo st ! Plu s wh at yo u sho ul d do immediately afte r you fi nish riding for the day [brief the me chanic , eye I e n e _ S • NOVEMB ER 19 , 2003 11