In 1977 Thierry Sabine became lost while contesting a rally between Abidjan and Nice. The 28-year-old spent three nights alone in the Libyan desert, nearly dying from exposure before finally being rescued. While awaiting salvation, Sabine had come to a conclusion – but this was not a religious awakening or a pledge to live a better life. In fact, he had decided that the wide-open spaces of the North African desert would be the perfect place for him to organise a rally of his own. His reaction to the experience was typical of Sabine, a free-spirited adventurer who would lose his life in the desert within a decade. But the event that he founded lives on. What is now known as the Dakar Rally was dreamt up as an adventurer’s challenge, but rapidly grew into one of the world’s most famous and controversial races.

AN UNLIKELY SUCCESS

A press officer from a wealthy French family, Sabine was also a motorsport enthusiast with a fearless approach to life. While still in his twenties he created an iconic motorcycle endurance event in his hometown of Le Touquet that still runs today, and competed at several major rallies and races, including the Le Mans 24 Hours. Friends recall that Sabine was fast, but threw away strong results because of his daring driving. After his three-night stay in the desert he immediately set about organising an event that would allow others to experience its incredible magnitude. He began raising funds and, appropriately enough, the Oasis drinks company came on board as sponsors. In December 1978 the first Paris-Dakar began. As the name suggests it took competitors from the French capital to its Senegalese equivalent, kicking off on Boxing Day and lasting almost three weeks. 182 competitors took the start for the inaugural running, with motorcyclist Cyril Neveu winning after a 10,000-kilometre trip across the Sahara. Sabine’s experiment was judged to be an unqualified success.