Rosario, January 2, 2015. The driver was happy about his performance during the distance that he could complete, but sad about the consequences of the accident involving Chinese driver Meiling Guo, which left four spectators injured, two of them seriously. These were the declarations of Álvaro Chicharro, Foton´s team driver, after participating in the presentation ceremony in Buenos Aires and the Dakar´s first special stage which was 11 km long, of which he was able to complete just eight.

“It was a difficult day. All accidents are unfortunate, even more when there are injured people. But regarding the race itself, we had a good pace during the distance that we could complete before the race was suspended: the pickup runs well, Patito (Patricio Legarreta) was navigating splendidly, so we are happy in this regard, but the truth is that an accident like this “gets you down”, said Chicharro.

Regarding tomorrow´s stage from Rosario to Villa Carlos Paz, which is held on Saturday and is 662 km long, 258 of them timed, the weather forecast announces heavy rain, but Chicharro does not seem faced: “If it rains as we are told, this is going to be more entertaining. We will have to be careful, but I have experience in slippery terrain, in fact during the Desafío Guaraní (2014) there was an incredible amount of rain, and we finish without issue in this same pickup. I am not worried about the rain. The authorities will see if they need to shorten the road distance or leave it as it is, but the truth is that I am not afraid”.

“The Foton Sauvana is good, I am falling in love with it (laughs). It behaves well on turns, in fact sometimes we enter turns at an skewed angle. As it is still being developed, the idea is to extract small details that we can find day-to-day, so we hope that as the stages unfold we can keep it neat”. The driver from Copiapó, Rodrigo “Mamoro” Moreno, defined his first experience with his new pickup as follows: “It satisfied me, the only small gripe is that the engine overheated a little, but they are already working to improve the air intake so the radiator can cool better. I was well satisfied, in fact I made some small jumps and I liked the suspension very much”.