For a long time now, it has been traditional for famous company teams such as Porsche and BMW motorbikes to put their faith in the robustness and reliability of MAN trucks whenever optimum support vehicles are required for the Paris-Dakar rally.

When faults occur during assessment tests, the required spare parts plus the matching tools have to be on site "just in time", which is why 15 MAN assistance trucks are involved in the racing assessment: This is the prerequisite for participating in the assessment tests. 15 further MAN trucks will be taken to the individual service points in the convoy of service vehicles. A total of 30 MAN trucks will be driven on behalf of various motorbike and car manufacturers such as KTM, Volkswagen, BMW, Mitsubishi, Toyota and Hyundai.

Seated at the wheel of the Touaregs, X5's , Pajeros or LandCruisers is an illustrious group of participants including professional and amateur racing drivers, members of the European Parliament and also artisans. Among them are Jutta Kleinschmidt, the guiding star of long-haul rally sport and overall victor in the 2001 Paris-Dakar, and Jean-Marie Pfaff, former successful goalkeeper with FC Bayern Munich.

MAN truck models ME2000 and FE2000 in the all-wheel version, thousands of which have been tried and tested in daily use, prove how outstandingly reliable they are under the extremely tough racing conditions too. Alongside the LE2000, the high-mobility SX2000 vehicles acting as service trucks form the logistic backbone of numerous teams.

Most of the MAN vehicles participating are prepared by MAN contract partner Toni Maurer of Türkheim, Bavaria and adapted to the required racing and safety standards with genuine MAN parts.

Further information:

www.man-motorsport.com
www.dakar.com
www.marathonrally.com

The MAN pilots continue to set the tone in the quasi-series class. At the third last meeting of the current season, the MAN drivers made their mark on the proceedings with two four-fold victories and one three-fold success. The keenest point collector in the Truck Super Prix in Zolder, Belgium, was Lutz Bernau, even though he could still not decisively reduce the distance between himself and Stuart Oliver.

There were exciting battles for the positions behind the two MAN pilots too. The dramatic decision fell in the Cup Race between Egon Allg?uer and his young team colleague Adam Lacko. Right on the last few meters the Czech newcomer snatched up the place on the victors' podium which routine driver Allg?uer safely believed to be his. Swiss man Daniel Seiler was also angry afterwards because he lost two places towards the end of the final round to father and son Rodrigues.

Oliver now has a 32-point lead over Bernau – normally this "buffer" would suffice for the Brit in the two remaining races in order to win the European Championship for the first time in his long career.

In a good two weeks Stuart Oliver will be going to the most important truck race of the year, the German Truck Grand Prix on the Nürburgring in the lead in the European championship classification. At the weekend in the Grand Prix Camion in Nogaro, South France, the British driver in his MAN TGA defended his position as table leader with a respectable performance in the quasi-series class. A record number of drivers had once again signed up for the quasi-series class. From the 29 entries 27 competitors actually took part on the day and made for busy traffic on the race track in the race class events.

At the start of the second cup race Egon Allg?uer (MAN-TGA) took the lead com-ing out of the first bends. To begin with Bernau kept hot on his heels but it didn't take long before the order was really shaken up. In the third round Bernau ended up in the gravel and Egon Allg?uer, who had jumped the gun, was given a stop-and-go penalty and ordered back to the pit road. This left Adam Lacko to take over the lead whilst Allg?uer completed the detour at a record speed and re-turned to the track in second place: The Austrian rejoined the race just ahead of Stuart Oliver's silver MAN TGA.

On this day the British driver Stuart Oliver came in third in both heats and with easy composure defended his overall lead in the European championship ahead of Allg?uer and Lacko, his MAN colleagues who have the same score as each other. Bernau is just behind in fourth place. You don't need to be a prophet to foresee that the European championship in 2004 will be decided by these four pilots.

Estoril/Portugal: First round in the European Truck Racing Cup 2003 MAN sets the pace this year too Lutz Bernau in top form: three wins, one second place

The new Truck Race began like the old one left off: with impressive performances from the MAN drivers. Lutz Bernau above all was in excellent form, crossing the finishing line in first place four times. As he incurred a ten-second penalty for overspeeding, however, he had to pass on the trophy for the second cup race to Egon Allg?uer only an hour after receiving it.

The start of competition for the 2003 European Truck Racing Cup was as usual somewhat turbulent. As Continental, the tyre supplier of many years, had pulled out at the end of the last season, the FIA was forced to alter the rules on tyres during the winter break. The upshot of this is that in the Race Class only certain series-production tyres are permitted from now on. Some teams had bought up the last stocks of the fast Conti tyres, but that did anythng but help them.

"The new rules will ensure more equality of opportunity and make racing more exciting again", said Toni Iddon, long-standing Race Director appointed by the FIA, commenting on the new situation. For a change most drivers shared his opinion. Lutz Bernau, whose participation this season had been in doubt for a long time, was one of those who found his feet quickly on the unaccustomed and low-grip tyres. His only concern: "As long as the wather is dry everything is OK. But I'm worried that with the series tyres the trucks will become completely undriveable in the rain".

The first week-end's racing this year started with two free training units, and even here the two dominant drivers of last season set the pace. European champion Egon Allg?uer came in behind Bernau's blue MAN each time, and the results of training against the clock were the same. This gave the German the optimum position for the heat, and he completed his day's work with two impeccable victories in the heat and the cup race. Behind him each time was the truck bearing the no. 1 of the reigning champion.

Lutz Bernau continued his victory run on the second day too and dominated even the warm-up session. He secured the pole position again; his fastest lap time was 1.7 seconds better than Allg?uer's, who ranked second here.

Almost one-third of the 27 starters in the quasi-series Race Class this year have entered on MAN race trucks. Alongside Allg?uer and Bernau Stuart Oliver from UK and Serafim Silva from Portugal will be competing for the entire season. All of them have TGA vehicles. As announced last year, Egon Allg?uer has also reinforced his team: Daniel Seiler of Switzerland will likewise be rolling up to the starting line at all ten meetings leading up to the FIA European Truck Racing Cup. Apart from Bernau and Allg?uer, the experienced Briton Oliver,who this year is driving for David Atkins, was the most successful contestant, collecting a total of 37 points. In the week-end's second heat the MAN drivers even managed to conquer the first five places.

The next meeting will be held at Misano Adriatico (Italy) on 24th/25th May.