60 days until the 2009 Dakar Rally in Argentina and Chile

A demanding endurance test: in January, Volkswagen will contest the famous and notoriously tough Dakar Rally, which will be staged in Argentina and Chile for the fist time - thus tackling the greatest challenge motorsport has to offer. What are the sporting implications of the 30th round of the Dakar Rally for the four driver/co-driver duos in the Race Touareg 2 vehicles? What are the technical challenges to be met? And how is the complex logistical effort behind Volkswagen's factory commitment being handled?

Answers to these and further questions can be found in several topical packages with information, brief interviews as well as facts and figures provided by Volkswagen for downloading on a weekly basis as part of the media countdown until the "Dakar".

At home in the deserts of the world: the Race Touareg for the "Dakar". When the Dakar Rally starts to its maiden round in South America in the new year (03 - 18 January 2009) the Volkswagen Race Touareg 2 will prove its purpose and character. The 280-hp cross-country rally prototype has been designed to perfectly master one of the "Dakar" principles: "Expect the Unexpected".

Hard, stony and thus difficult-to-drive-on ground, soft sand in the "Atacama", the world's driest desert with the highest dune fields on earth, as well as extreme passages through water - all this is awaiting the high-tech 4x4 vehicle during the toughest test motorsport has to offer: a test of reliability in order to reach the finish at the end of 14 tough legs leading across a roughly 9,000-km distance - and a test of performance capability in order to master these conditions as the best overall contender.

Uncompromising prototype for toughest off-road rally competitions. Numerous technical solutions make Volkswagen's "Dakar" prototype an uncompromising rally vehicle. The prototype's high-tech body, optimized for aerodynamic efficiency on the one hand and assuring good driver visibility on the other, primarily consists of carbon fiber-reinforced plastics. The actual body tips the scales at just about 50 kilograms.

The basic shape of the "RT2" was developed by the Volkswagen Design Studio Braunschweig as early as in 2005 and subsequently refined in wind tunnel tests as well by means of complex CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) calculations. But the body of the Race Touareg 2 has since been subjected to various detailed improvements. The most recent one: in 2009, for example, the drivers will enjoy an even flatter engine bonnet at the "Dakar" which gives them better visibility of the permanently changing track conditions.

The Race Touareg's backbone is an extremely torsion-resistant space frame to which the suspension components - double wishbones at the front and rear axles - are mounted. They, too, have reached the next evolutionary step in the direct development for the 2009 Dakar Rally. Modifications to rear suspension kinematics reduce the car's roll movement and thus enable more precise handling. The space frame cage made of aviation steel has to absorb the enormous forces occurring on special stages and represents a safety aspect for the drivers in case of an accident.