The hydrogen-powered HySE-X1 is now two stages away from its goal of completing the 46th Dakar Rally.
Jamie Campbell and Bruno Jacomy completed Wednesday’s 61km sandy stage through the desert around Al-Ula and are confident of reaching the finish in Yanbu on Friday.
“The stage was sandy and we had to conserve fuel at the beginning. The landscape was beautiful, especially coming in to the stage finish. We really got to open up the car here, 95 to 100km/h. The HySE hydrogen engine is running perfectly.”
Jamie Campbell, Driver
“In the first half we conserved too much the hydrogen and then, on the last part, we pushed a little bit and it was a really good stage for the team. We had a good finish. The last 10km we were full gas; the engine was really good.”
Bruno Jacomy, Co-driver
Project leader Keita Nakanishi said the stage, close to where the HySE-X1 ran the Prologue on January 5th, was originally 85km of soft sand. A shortcut option let the team try short-distance, high-load running, so the crew did not have to worry about fuel and could drive comfortably, particularly on the flat sections.
Stage 9 to Al-Ula
Tuesday’s stage from Ha’il to Al-Ula was shortened to 94km, but it ran entirely on sandy piste cut up by tracks, and fuel use was a problem again. The HySE-X1 covered about 74km, needed outside help through the middle section, and reached the stage finish on its remaining hydrogen.
“Stage nine was tough with some soft sand and it dragged the car down quite a bit. We did the best we could and got about 74km. It was almost 100% sand.”
Jamie Campbell, Driver
HySE (Hydrogen Small mobility & Engine technology) runs in the Dakar Future Programme’s Mission 1000 class with an SSV developed jointly by Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki, Toyota and Yamaha on an Overdrive Racing chassis.