So, what can we do better next year -- Dakar Coverage?

I think we lack boots on the ground. Full time ie.,

A pair of 4x4s with a 4 member crew each should be able to get good coverage through out the event. I'm quite interested to follow the 2013 Dakar in such a fashion while taking a lot of videos/pics/interviews at every possible opportunity. Contribution from inmates would go a long way to help put an ADV team for this purpose.

If ever this idea takes off, i'll be glad to perform driver/mech/photog duties as i'm not good with interviewing/PR skills....

where else will my desert driving skills come to use

I for one really enjoyed the Firehose-thread. Great source of information, and a great way to share new things. I'll be sure to chip in again next year

starting with a huge anti-Peterhansel post

I am working up a plan to do just this next year. I'm a journalist with 20 years experience as a reporter, photographer and editor. I love the Dakar but I'll never ride it. But I could cover it. I'll be contacting the ASO to work on logistics in the next few weeks. It's my understand that they charge a lot of money for a press pass, so that could be a deal killer if it's ridiculously expensive.

As for this year's coverage, I think F5 had it all going on. I got blasted off the fire hose early on, but the Cliff's Notes version was invaluable, as was the media thread. Rally Radio was incredible. I'd like to see way more coverage of privateers, the "dreamer" types if you will, which is what I'd do if I get over there. Coma and Depres are interesting, but they are also aliens. The magic and beauty of Dakar is that guys like Ned can still do it if they have the will, and the stones.

Sorry I couldn't help as much as I would have liked with the Cliff Notes thread, Flood and Packmule; I was often in the mode of "print a shirt, hit F5, print a shirt, hit F5..." It was a miracle I followed as closely as I did.

BY FAR the best year for F5 coverage yet. The sneaky "chatytv" and "justin Tv" links were awesome; thanks for finding those MyWay and everyone else. The Youtube vids of the days coverage were awesome. Maybe a sequence of random numbers as a title, and a link here, would keep them up longer. Of course that would be wrong.

But my favorite, as usual, is the Rally Raidio call in's. I think, if we could get a few more members that are in the race or in the Bivouac to call in, that would make it even better. Maybe a commitment from the F5 crew to fund Sat phones for the guys willing to call in regularly.

Thanks for dedicating so much time to this, Nate and Flood, and Kaia. It was a great year.

PS: and as always, I will ride a bike in the Dakar and make daily call ins in exchange for full ride sponsorship. Your welcome. I'll start training tomorrow.

Better? I think 2012 will be hard to match! We had Neduro, and he finished in fine style while sharing his first hand experience every day. Very hard to replicate that.

Thanks very much Nate. Dakar should pay you. Maybe give you a free entry to ride along.

in the cliff notes keep track of ADV members in the race.. beside that .. nothing..

++++!!!!!!!!!!1111111111

I also found myself more intrigued with the car battle and Robbie Gordon than the motorcycles which is wierd for a motocicle nut like my
self. so I would like to also hear updates from the Gordon or other USA racer camps, not just the bikes.

So as has already been said. There HAS to be a way of funding a USA roving reporting contingent. If you have heard of On The Throttle TV http://www.onthethrottle.com/ , they are a couple of Utah based roadracing fans with dedicated interest in it just like us adv riding freaks who were fed up with the lack of roadracing coverage on American tv. They went out and did something about it and have done a wonderufl job with it! From just two guys roving around Miller Motorsports Park http://millermotorsportspark.com/
doing their own reporting to what you see above on their site with collaborations all over the roadracing world. There's no reason why it can't be done on the advriding/rally side at the same level.

Better? You're kidding. You have rocked this thing all the way home.
During the Baja, I literally walked a game trail into my carpet (no worries, it was old and had to get ripped out anyway ) but during the 2012 Dakar, you saved my new floor. Despite the fact the TV coverage was spotty as usual and I spent more time searching for decent live on-line feeds than anything else, I managed not to go (more) insane simply because of the outstanding coverage you provided and the reassuring radio-call ins I knew I could count on-it was simply fabulous.

I don't think that these numbers are the Paul Harvey, just one part of the whole. If you account for all the other dakar threads, sticky and non-sticky, then I think you can just look at the above table and double the numbers for this year. Yes, double. Look around at the views on the cliff notes. The media thread. Then dive into Ned and Bill's threads. And so on.

We've gotten a LOT bigger than it appears in the numbers, too. Eurosport is using us as a reference. So are the the actual race teams, and not just those that we have ties to. To me, this implies an onus of responsibility on our part to make it not necessarily better per se, but to focus on reliability and accuracy. Yeah, we're just a bunch of gearheads that go gaga for this stuff, but it's become more than just a fan thing.

It wasn't intentional, but we became relevant.


Just something to keep in mind, I think.

Better,better than it is now, I live in Europe and have been into this race since the early 80's and I've never had so much infomation as now, if memory serves me right it got half a page at the back of the MCN, under the title "French madmen ride into sahara"
those early guys really had balls but no twitter/facebook or satphones so have gone
unreported.google Dakar 1979 and go from there for more info,as for making the coverage better short of flying me out to SA you guys have it all covered.Many many thanks to you all.

A photo of the Gordon endo?

Interesting point. How does Team F5 start acting like grown-up's in amongst world-class athletes?

The only idea I have is to recruit a few spanish & english speaking interpreters who will pick the choicest videos/written statements and translate them/do a voice over (if possible). And perhaps even expand this to french etc. to help fill in some of the non english info that is available.

Just an idea.

JJ

On one level, who cares?

On another level, it's already happening on its own. Back in the first few days of this year's rally there was a discussion about how the number of posts were on pace, but the quality had changed. Where just a couple years ago you were getting four or five posts every time someone crossed a checkpoint, those repeats have been replaced by content and information. 205's still happen, but not like it was.

I'd be afraid to monkey with the formula too much, for fear of screwing it up. I do like the rule about Doyle getting to make the first post, though.

I also liked the idea of bunting the excessive francophobe/xenophobe posts to the basement this year.

The only problem with that is 'big brother'. We have enough government. Not any really harm done with a few hostile posts about the French or various characters. We don't want a censor system. I mean we are
Motorcyclists! WTF?

That doesn't mean we have to be classless dicks about it.

You are right, but you would rather have censorship? I mean who cares other than a few like you. It's the internet...

I think a lot of people were getting tired of it for about a 36-hour cycle. Light moderation is needed in a group this size, and "Racing" isn't "JoMomma". I see no need to let disrespect get the better of us, especially when the host of this great website is giving us the space for free - and he's obviously set the tone here as "civil". I choose to respect that, and welcome any efforts to keep it respected. I see no reason if someone wants to start a bashing thread in the basement, why they can't. Just keep it out of here, is all I'm suggesting.