Thierry sabine biography

French racing driver and race organizer

Thierry Sabine (13 June 1949, Neuilly-sur-Seine – 14 January 1986, Mali) was a French wrangler, motorcycle racer and founder and main organizer of the Dakar Rally.

Career

In 1977 Sabine got lost on the Tchigai Plateau, near the isolated mountain of Emi Fezzan during the Abidjan-Nice Race, and realized that the desert would be a good location for a rally where amateurs could test their ability. In December 1977 he established a race from Paris to Dakar and devoted the rest of his life to its organization. His motto for the Dakar Rally was, "A challenge for those who go. A dream for those who stay behind."

Sabine was noted for the care he took over the competitors, which was exemplified during the 1983 running of the event. That year, the route crossed the as-yet-unexplored Ténéré region of the Sahara and 40 competitors became lost when a sandstorm struck. He spent four days flying over the region and was able to direct all lost competitors toward the correct route. Nicole Maitrot, a competitor the previous year, said of him:

"One has the impression that Thierry Sabine is God looking over his sheep from up in his helicopter, coming down in a swirl of airplane to help those who are lost."

Sabine was killed when his Ecureuil helicopter crashed into a dune at Mali during a sudden sandstorm at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday 14 January 1986. Also killed onboard was the singer-songwriter Daniel Balavoine, helicopter pilot François-Xavier Bagnoud, journalist Nathalie Odent and Jean-Paul Lefur who was a radiophonic engineer for RTL. Sabine's ashes were later scattered at the Lost Tree in Niger, which the rally thereafter described as the "Arbre Thierry Sabine".

He was featured in the movie A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later released in 1986.

Racing record

Complete 24 Hours of Le Mans results

Complete Tour de France Automobile results

Refere

13/6/1949 - 14/1/1986

Record updated 12-Jun-06

French motorcycle racer and founder and main organizer of Paris Dakar who died in a helicopter crash in 1986.

French motorcycle racer - founder and main organizer of Paris Dakar. The story goes that in 1977 he got lost in sands of Libyan Desert during Abidjan-Nice Race. During this time he decided that the desert would be a good location for a regular rally, where every amateur of racing life could check his abilities. And, in December 1977, he manadge to arrange the first running of the race with starting in Paris and ending in Dakar. He devoted his life to organising the Paris Dakar Rally. He died during the race in an operators helicopter crash in 1986.

Thierry Sabine (Neuilly-sur-Seine, 13 de junho de 1949 - Mali, 14 de janeiro de 1986) foi um pilotomotociclistafrancês e organizador de provas desportivas. É conhecido, principalmente, por ser o criador e inspirador do rali “Paris-Dakar”.

Biografia

Começou por criar, em 1975, o Enduro du Touquet, uma competição regional que, com o decorrer do tempo, teve grande desenvolvimento. Na sequência promoveu a Croisière Verte, um enduro que ligava Le Touquet a Sète por caminhos.

Em 1977 perdeu-se no deserto da Líbia, devido a uma tempestade de areia, quando participava no rali Abidjan-Nice, numa Yamaha XT 500. Depois de a fraca organização da prova ter encerrado as buscas, ao fim de três dias, sem combustível na moto, Sabine foi encontrado, no limite da desidratação, pelo piloto de uma pequena aeronave que lhe terá dito “meu amigo, daqui para a frente, tudo o que você viver será lucro”. Enquanto esteve perdido, apesar do seu sofrimento, estava apaixonado pelo deserto e prometeu que, se sobrevivesse, organizaria anualmente a maior prova de todo-terreno jamais vista, saindo da Europa e atravessando a África através do deserto, que mais tarde definiu como “um desafio para os que vão e um sonho para os que ficam”. Desde então consagrou a sua vida à organização do “Paris-Dakar”.

Morreu a 14 de janeiro

Notes:
The eighth edition of the Paris-Dakar Rally started from Versailles, Paris, on Wednesday, 01 January and finished at the Rose Lake in Dakar, Senegal, on Wednesday, 22 January 1986. With 486 competitors at the start - 131 motorcycles, 282 cars and 73 trucks - this was the second-largest field to date, exceeded only by the 1985 event which listed 550 competitors. The almost 15,000-kilometer (9,325-mile) route passed from France through Algeria, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Mauritanie and Senegal, along the course: Paris Cergy - Versailles - Sète - Alger - El Golea - In Salah - Tamanrasset - Agadez - Dirkou - Agadem - Zinder - Niamey - Gourma Rharous - Bamako - Labé - Kayes - Kiffa - Saint Louis - Sali Portudal - Dakar.

Only 100 vehicles - 71 cars and trucks, 29 motorcycles - reached the finish line of the rally. René Metge-Dominique Lemoyne in a Porsche 959 were the winners in the car competition. Cyril Neveu of France won the motorcycle gold, and a Unimog Mercedes carried the Italian team of Giacomo Vismara and Giulio Minelli to first place among the trucks. The event was marred by a number of accidents, that resulted in the deaths of two motorcycle entrants, Yasuko Keneko of Japan and Giampaolo Marinoni of Italy, and many injured people, including the Czechoslovakian driver of a Liaz truck, who was temporarily paralyzed from the waist down; a third rider, Jean-Michel Baron of France was seriously injured and passed away, after spending twenty-four years in a vegetative state till his death, on 02 September 2010.

The 1986 edition of the Paris-Alger-Dakar Rally is most noted for the helicopter accident that took the lives of its founder and organizer Thierry Sabine and five other persons: a well-known French pop singer Daniel Balavoine, the journalist Nathalie Odent, a radio engineer Jean-Paul Le Fur and the helicopter pilot François-Xavier Bagnold.

The white helicopter Ecureuil named "Sierra" crashed at 19h30 on Tuesday, 14 January 1986, into a dun