“No one can prepare for how hard this is”
معلومات عن الطاقم
- When going down the slopes of Canada or the United States as an FIS skier, little did Nathan Hayashi know that he would one day be on the start line of the Dakar. Of course, growing up in Calgary, he had a passion for motorsports watching all sorts of races on TV with his dad but it was all about alpine skiing and specifically Slalom and Giant Slalom on the slopes of resorts like Beaver Creek, Whistler Mountain or Lake Louise.
- One of the links from skiing to Dakar came through Luc Alphand, a former World Cup winner that he would look up to back in the day and that crossed over to offroad racing, winning the Dakar in 2006. Inspiring. Funnily enough both men got to meet on the bivouac of the Morocco Rally back in October.
- His move to cross-country rallying came gradually and rather unexpectedly. First and foremost, when he founded the Gear Shop, a workshop that makes 4X4 vehicles into works of art. That’s where he really got into the cross-country world.
- And then came the idea of doing the Dakar. Studying the question very carefully and surrounding himself with experienced people, he went to see what it was the event was like last January to have a real idea of what he was up for. He then first competed in the Sonora Rally on his side of the Atlantic before taking on the Rallye du Maroc a few months ago.
- The other issue was the car. The idea was to come with his custombuilt Ford Bronco but regulations had to be met and it wasn’t before final checks during the Morocco Rally, that Nathan got the go to be registered in a specific SCORE class.
- So, after a lot of hard work, concerns, discussions, meetings and technical updates, Nathan Hayashi will finally be living his dream on Saudi soil. At his side he’ll be counting on the help of his navigator Shane Hairsine.
طموح
N.H.: “My dream really was to race motorcycles growing up on, and I loved Moto GP. And I also grew up watching rally and formula one. Motorsports in general just is a speed thing. Going fast is amazing. So, it started at a young age, driven from the world of skiing. The Dakar? I saw posters of these big trucks and I think it was just the romanticism, the romantic notion of going from Paris and then through this desert and these guys were just like these superheroes, always so serious and dirty, and it was just rugged and I thought, wow, that is so cool. We used to watch Luc Alphand growing up to analyse our ski racing with his on VHS, and then I read that he started racing Dakar in a BMW X5, and this was so cool.
I never, ever thought it would be some sort of project that we would be a part of at some point. But here we are. It would never be in my reality as a Canadian and never being in the motorsport world, and never having these connections, I always felt these things were so impossible that you just don't even think about trying. It’s outside your reality.
We're very excited and very happy to where we've come so far. And for Canadians, I think this is monumental for a country that has never done this before, as a team. We hope to bring more Canadians, North Americans as well, to the race series, to the Score ultimate class that's been created just for us.
No one can prepare you for how hard it is and the amount of hours that you have to work behind the scenes with the team, with the organisers, to make sure that it all works. every fibre of your body has to believe that the outcome will be positive. If I worry, the team will worry. And I have to maintain that everything is going to be okay regardless of what happens. We will never give up. We'll try to find that solution as we're out there. And if it doesn't work, we'll be back again.
In the way that I've lived my life, I don't sleep a lot. There are always some sort of issue to figure out, to figure out puzzles. And, I love driving. I could drive 78 hours straight, if I could. The driving part to me is I will love that every minute. And I feel like we've been training for this for a very long time, just getting our bodies used to this type of activity. I look forward to that.”
