Dakar and WRC bids could run in tandem, says Nissen

1st September 2010

By Giles Wade

Despite speculation to the contrary, Volkswagen sporting chief Kris Nissen says he is in no hurry to end the firm’s Dakar programme to move into the World Rally Championship.

Having recently launched the third evolution of the off-road Touareg – the Race Touareg 3 – Nissen says there is no reason why VW would not keep using it until a more competitive rival machine comes along.

Nissen pointed out the development costs on the new car have been done and the more Dakar competition it does, the more cost-effective it becomes.

“For the last two years we have a good car and a good package which means we don’t have to do a lot,” said Nissen. “That makes it a lot easier on the cost side because it means we don’t need to make a completely new car and the costs – for us – are going down.
“The budget for the Dakar is really reasonable, actually it’s cheap compared with the benefit we get. If we did many more races with the Touareg [in a year] the cost would be higher because of the amount of manpower we would need. But extending the Dakar programme by one or two years is certainly possible. Really, we can do this until somebody comes with a really good car and team and then you need to take a decision.”