Carlos Sainz Sr. scripted history on Friday after he became the oldest driver to win the Dakar Rally at the age of 61. This is the Spanish driver’s fourth title in the Dakar rallying series. As Sainz Sr. basked in glory, his Ferrari driver son Carlos Sainz made sure he was present with his father for the celebration.
Sainz Sr’s win in the Dakar Rally wasn’t just full of record and history, but also money. The victory in the desert was worth €50,000 or roughly around $54,445. This achievement from the 61-year-old comes right after a year of breaking his back in last season.
This win is indeed historic and that’s for multiple reasons. Firstly it was the age factor of the driver and secondly, it was Audi’s first victory in this category. The 1990 and 1992 World Rally Champion drove the Audi RS Q e-tron which has a 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo engine and uses an energy converter.
Carlos Sainz Sr. won his 4th Dakar and Carlos was right there on the finish line waiting for him pic.twitter.com/fHxItY8WaN
— ☆ ari (@itsme_ari_hi) January 19, 2024
Sainz Sr’s victory has also been phenomenal given he was not the fastest driver racing. Despite this, he finished one hour 20 mins and 25 seconds ahead of Overdrive Toyota’s Guillaume de Mevius and the fastest driver and a nine-time world rally champion Sebastian Loeb.
Loeb had a mechanical failure on Thursday, and Nasser Al-Attiyah failed to finish the race. The victory helped Sainz Sr. be on level terms with Ari Vatanen. He is now behind Al-Attiyah with five wins and Peterhansel with nine wins. All of these were made possible after fracturing his T5 and T6 vertebrae during a crash last year in the same event.
Carlos Sainz Sr. and his rally records
Carlos Sainz Cenamor is one of the greatest Rally drivers to grace the game. He is also a motorsport legend of his country having 26 Rally wins under his name and 97 podiums. He has nearly two decades of experience in Rally and raced for teams like Ford, Toyota, Lancia, Subaru, and Citroen.
His long career has inspired his son Sainz Jr. to take up motorsport as his desired career option. However, the Ferrari driver chose to go Fernando Alonso’s way, not the way taken by his father. Despite this, Sainz Sr. has often come out to negotiate terms on behalf of his son.
The 61-year-old has been associated with Audi lately and this provided him with a vantage point to negotiate about his son’s F1 career. The Spanish veteran warned Ferrari about their treatment of his son and if things go haywire, Sainz Sr. would not think twice before bringing his son to Audi two years later.
Audi is all set to arrive in F1 in 2026 when the new regulations are also coming in. The German giants would take over the Sauber team and would be needing two experienced drivers in the line-up. Therefore, Carlos Sainz Jr. might just be a very good addition.
