Maurik van den Heuvel will not participate in the Dakar Rally 2023 this winter. The trucker from Boekel has decided to skip a year after he crashed during the last edition in January. That also happened a year earlier. Van den Heuvel is also too busy and is not so charmed by the atmosphere in host country Saudi Arabia.
Maurik van den Heuvel took part in the toughest rally in the world nine times and finished six times. But since the Dakar Rally takes place in Saudi Arabia, the 50-year-old driver and his team Dakarspeed have not yet reached the finish line. In 2021 he had an accident in the 3rd stage and last January he overturned his truck twice in the 7th stage.
“If you then see your truck as a pathetic pile of scrap in the workshop, you no longer feel like it,” says Maurik van den Heuvel about his decision. “Then you think: not for a year. In addition, I have a new company and I am very busy with it. But it is true that if my truck had been spic and span, I would have participated again .”
“I miss South America, because in Saudi Arabia there are only 20 spectators and 20 camels.
The trucker is not afraid to crash again. “No, there is certainly no fear. Never has been, because that is part of the game. There is always disappointment after a crash, because you have worked a whole year with a team towards the Dakar Rally. I made last time a stupid mistake and then it’s looked at. But I can handle my loss.”
The fact that the Dakar Rally will only pass through Saudi Arabia for the fourth consecutive year makes his decision a lot easier. The neighboring countries are again not involved, as in the previous ten years in South America.
“It is a beautiful country to drive through”, says Van den Heuvel about the oil state, “but otherwise it is very boring. I miss the atmosphere of South America. The spare ribs, the warmth and a beer. And the people! Where in Buenos Aires hundreds of thousands stood at the start and finish, in Saudi Arabia there are only twenty spectators, twenty camels and twenty camera crews.”
“Maybe it will hurt when I see the first images of the Dakar Rally on telvisie.”
However, Maurik van den Heuvel may still scratch his head in January. Because the Russian Kamaz trucks are not participating because of the war, the chances for a victory for the Dutch are suddenly great.
“The Dutch and the Czechs are already arguing with the trucks about who gets the best start number,” laughs Van den Heuvel. “Everyone smells their chances of the overall victory and it will certainly be a very exciting race. But an accident is in a small corner, so there are no certainties.”
“Actually, it is also a pity that the Russians do not participate, because they are part of it anyway. And yes, I do too. Maybe it will hurt when I see the first images of the Dakar Rally on television. ”
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