Al-Attiyah to defend Dakar title
Qatari driver Nasser Al-Attiyah, the winner of this year's Dakar Rally, will defend his title in the 33rd running of the event next
month, according to the event's organisers Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO).
The announcement comes just three weeks before the rally is due to begin on 1 January in Mar Del Plata, Argentina, and despite the
withdrawal of the Volkswagen team with which he competed in 2011.
Al-Attiyah, who is the son of Qatar's Energy Minister, will instead drive in a Hummer for Team Robby Gordon as he tries to emulate the
achievements of Finn Ari Vatanen by winning the Dakar Rally in consecutive years. Vatanen won the famous race in 1990 and 1991.
Al-Attiyah's car will carry the number 300 traditionally reserved for the defending champion.
The race will start in Mar Del Plata, on Argentina's Atlantic coast, and will end on the Pacific coast at Lima in Peru on 15 January.
The 2012 Rally will run for 14 days in total -- compared to 12 this year -- with five stages in Argentina, five in Chile and then four in
Peru.
Last month, Al-Attiyah claimed that he would be competing in the 2012 World Rally Championship for Citroen, claims that the French
manufacturer later denied.
Al-Attiyah was disqualified from the Dakar Rally in 2009 for deliberately taking a short cut from the official route and by-passing
waypoints in order to save his overheating engine.