The people behind the world’s most challenging rally.
The Dakar Rally holds the notorious title of being the most gruelling rally in the world.
Beginning in 1977, the inaugural race saw 182 vehicles take to the starting line to traverse the 10,000km route from Paris to the Senegalese capital of Dakar. Of those 182 competitors, only 72 crossed the finish line. In 1991, Hino became the first ever Japanese truck manufacturer to enter the Dakar Rally.Over the years, the race has been held in various locations across the world:
- 1977-2008: Paris to Dakar
- 2009-2019: South America
- 2020-Now: Saudi Arabia
The 2024 event will be held from the 5th to 19th of January 2024, starting in the thousand-year-old city of AlUla, crossing the country to the Empty Quarter, and finishing in Yanbu on the shores of the Red Sea.
The Empty Quarter, often described as the "Desert of Death", will be more gruelling than ever before and challenge the teams with dramatically higher degrees of difficulty.
Hino’s Dakar Rally truck, otherwise known as the ‘Little Monster’ was developed based on the Japanese HINO600 Series. This medium-duty powerhouse was chosen due to its unmatched mobility and agile nature, competing against many more powerful heavy-duty vehicles. Competing against these odds, Hino Team Sugawara have consistently braved this rally with lightweight, agile trucks since they first entered the race. This year, Hino Team Sugawara will aim for their thirty-third completed Dakar Rally in a row. But before we watch the team tackle some of the earth’s most difficult terrain, we thought we’d get to know them a little better.
Hino Team Sugawara
Teruhito Sugawara, Team Director and Driver of Car 1.
Son of Yoshimasa Sugawara, the “Iron Man of Dakar”, Teruhito first joined the Dakar Rally team as a mechanic in 1998 and began navigating for his father the following year. Teruhito built his experience in off-road racing in Japan and Rally Mongolia, before stepping behind the wheel of the Hino 500 Series for the Pharoah Rally (Egypt) in 2003, finishing with a championship in the trucks category. Since 2005, he has raced alongside his father in the Dakar Rally as a father/son duo. With his father announcing his retirement at the end of the 2019 event, Teruhito stepped into his position as team director, and won his eleventh consecutive championship in the ‘Under 10-Litre Class’ in 2020, and most recently finished in 10th place in 2023.
Hirokazu Somemiya, Navigator, Car 1.
Hirokazu Somemiya has taken part in numerous races in Japan and overseas including the Japanese Rally Championship, Asia-Pacific Rally Championship, the American off-road racing event ‘BAJA1000’, and the Asia Cross Country Rally, serving as navigator and communications manager at various times.
Yuji Mochizuki, Navigator, Car 1.
Yuji Mochizuki joined the Hino Power Train and Evaluation Division in 2003, where he was part of the team evaluating engines for further development. His first rally as navigator was in 2020.
However, a rally team is more than just the driver and navigators. You need a team to ensure the vehicle keeps going, and a team to ensure everyone has what they need to get across the finish line.
The team working behind the scenes are:
Seiichi Suzuki, Mechanic.
Mayumi Kezuka, Mechanic.
Koji Yoshikawa, Mechanic.
Tadaaki Sato, Mechanic.
Tatsuharu Sato, Mechanic.
Masanori Sato, Mechanic.
Jumpei Morita, Mechanic.
Keigo Tada, Mechanic.
Takuma Tsuchiya, Manager.
Rumi Ando, Support Member.
Shun Konnai, Support Member.
Shotaro Hamai, Support Member.
There you have it, your Hino Team Sugawara for the 2024 Dakar Rally!
We’re in for some intense racing across some of the most stunning and brutal terrain the world has ever seen. We wish Hino Team Sugawara all the best. Follow their Facebook page to keep up with their progress, and help us cheer them on from Australia!