VOLUME ISSUE FEBRUARY , P97
mainly because the race was not
even 10 years old yet. But those
who did know about it knew it
was something extraordinary
(and dangerous), and Stearns
knew he wanted to do it. But
how? It's not like you just load
up your van, drive to France,
and sign up to race the Paris to
Dakar Rally.
"Somehow he got hooked up
with Yamaha France and [top
Dakar racer] Jean Claude Olivier,"
says Harden. "He was hired to
ride as Jean Claude's and [Ya
-
maha teammate] Franco Picco's
water boy at the 1985 Paris to
Dakar. Fortunately for Chuck,
Jean Claude and Franco had an
uneventful ride finishing second
and third overall behind Gaston
Rahier, and Chuck was able to
follow them across the line in
sixth overall, winning several
stages along the way."
Stearns rode a modified Ya
-
maha TT600 in the 22-day race.
"Back then no one except a
small handful of us even heard
about Dakar," says Harden. "I
knew it was a pretty big deal and
was happy for him."
So was Cycle News. My as
-
signment was to track Stearns
down and interview him about
his experiences in the race. I re-
member he was happy to oblige,
excited about his accomplish-
ment, and had plans to go back
to Europe for more races. In my
interview, I let Stearns do all the
talking.
"The rally itself started right at
the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France,"
he said in the interview. "[We]
headed down paved roads to
the Mediterranean—about 684
miles. It was a long haul. Then
we loaded up our bikes on a boat
and headed to Algeria, where we
all spent the night in a hotel."
It didn't take long for Stearns
to catch on to this new-to-him
rally stuff. He won the third
stage. His desert-racing experi
-
ence paid off here. "The third
special test section was 325
miles through very, very fast
desert—I won it by half an hour,"
he said.
Later in the interview, he
talked about the scariest part of
the rally. "The most difficult sec
-
tion of the rally was through the
Mietia Desert—there has never
been a road cut through there,
and that was scary. Everybody
got together and rode through
there together, but I went by
myself because I wanted to
make up time—it was kind of
like crossing hell. It was rocky,
absolutely no vegetation, and
it reminded me of Death Valley
[in California]. There were parts
where the sand dunes were so
soft it would bury my bike up to
the engine cases and cover the
front disc brake.
"This was the day I had the
most problems, I would hit sand
dunes that would swallow my
bike five, six or seven times in
one day. I would have to get off
Stearns, aboard a Yamaha
TT600, finished sixth in the Paris
to Dakar rally in 1985.
PIONEER
