With caution as strategy, Harith Noah finishes 47th in Prologue: Dakar 2023
Yanbu (Saudi Arabia), 31 Dec 2022: TVS Factory Racing star Harith Noah, the only rider from India at Dakar 2023, made a cautious beginning finishing the opening Prologue at 47th place in the overall classification and 26th in the Rally GP class, here on Saturday.
Watch the Sherco video of Noah’s Prologue here.
Caution was the strategy for this first timed-test and the Sherco TVS Factory rider clocked 9 minutes and 8 seconds to finish 47 among 138 riders. After three days of set-up and checks, the race is on for the Sherco Factory Rally Team. The riders left and rode the very slippery 13-km prologue using extreme caution. The route went around the base Sea Camp, on the shores of the Red Sea.
Harith Noah is taking part in the Bikes top class, the Rally GP and he has also entered for the Raid Raid World Championship, for which Dakar is the first leg.
Noah from Shoranur in Kerala, is taking part in his fourth Dakar, all in Saudi Arabia. He is a five-time Indian National Supercross champion. He trained hard in USA for about two months to develop his Road Book skills. The road book this year will be paperless and will only be on the digital monitors provided on the bike. As preparation he also took part in the Andalusia Rally and Rally of Morocco.
All of the riders followed the instructions of the team manager David Castero, who asked them to remain in the background and play it safe to ensure that everyone finished this short stage. A strategy of caution that proved to be judicious as a rider who started in front of them had a bad fall and finished his Dakar a few meters after the start.
“Another objective was to also start behind the race leaders tomorrow and follow in their tracks. The riders followed the instructions well, the bikes are working great, and the atmosphere is excellent within the team, which bodes well for the future,” said a Sherco team member.
Noah’s Sherco teammates Lorenzo Santolino finished P24 while Rui Gonçalvez came in next at P25.
Lorenzo Santolino said: “The special was very fast and slippery. I made a small error, but the sensations were very good! We are waiting for tomorrow’s starting order, the day which will be the real start of the race, the start of the premier race of the year!”
Tomorrow, the riders are getting down to business with a 603 km stage, including 368 km of special. The stage forms a loop, the start and finish will be at Sea camp.
About Harith Noah
It took him two editions to learn and adapt but 6 years after CS Santosh, Harith Noah became the third Indian rider to reach the finish of the world’s toughest rally. Not only did he achieve his dream he also managed the best ever performance for an Indian claiming an excellent 20th overall position in 2021.
In the footsteps of pioneers Santosh CS and Aravind Prabhakar, the young man from Kerala, but born in Germany had a rather long journey before taking on rallies. It started on his sixteenth birthday when he was given a motorbike. A weekend later, he was racing and although he finished last of that first race, his passion grew. His first encounter with the Dakar came thanks to the video tapes his dad would bring back from his business trips all over the world. He was 5 years old then and far from imagining that he would be on the start line of the 2020 Dakar.
Part of the Sherco TVS factory team, Noah’s first encounter with the race was a hard one. He was indeed forced to retire from the rally as soon as day 3 due to technical issues. But thanks to the new “Dakar Experience” that allows competitors to carry on while no longer being in the general classification, he was able to learn and gain experience. For his fourth attempt, after again failing to finish last year, the 29-year old who took part in the Morocco and Andalucia rallies this year, will again be alongside his team mates Lorenzo Santolino and Rui Gonçalves with the goal to once again do better than his starting number 20.
“I got my first bike in 2009 and on the next weekend I was racing in the paddy fields by my house in Kerala. I fell in love with it immediately. Two years later I became national supercross champion in the privateer class. My focus was really on supercross, not the Dakar and then TVS got involved. About the last Dakar, my 3rd attempt, the two weeks got over pretty quick. To be honest I was not satisfied, but I believe this will give me an extra drive to keep pushing forward. It’s another mindset riding a stage at the Dakar with nothing to lose,” said Noah on the official Dakar site.
