Injured soldiers finish
second Dakar Rally

Quin Evans was one of the able-bodied civilians competing with Race2Recovery – a team of severely injured soldiers who have finished the gruelling race for a second time.

The 14-day epic adventure sees teams travel thousands of miles through tough terrain, including deserts and mountain ranges in Argentina, Bolivia and Chile.

The team became the first ever disabled team to finish the event last year and have repeated the feat in the 2014 rally.

More than half of the racers who took part in the event were forced to withdraw.

Race2Recovery crossed the finish line at Valparaiso in Chile on Saturday.

Tony Harris, the team’s founder, said: “The team has once again lived up to its motto ‘Beyond Injury, Achieving the Extraordinary’. We had a bit of a bumpy ride early on but we all pulled together and showed what willpower and teamwork can achieve.

“The race truck crew have been a credit to us and to the Dakar as a whole. On several occasions they selflessly stopped on-stage to rescue other teams in difficulty and, in doing so, made their own race challenge all the more difficult. That shows the spirit of our team but also the spirit of this fantastic event.”

The Race2Recovery team included 16 members with two Wildcat race cars, a race truck, two Land Rover Discovery support vehicles and a support truck. Two of the race vehicles were forced to retire from the competition and the team then focused all efforts onto the race truck.