Dakar, 2001: Two Buggies Jumped the Start, and Jutta Kleinschmidt Won

Senegal, January 20, 2001. One day is left in the Paris-Dakar Rally, and Hiroshi Masuoka is leading it in his Mitsubishi.

The rally left Paris on New Year's Day. It has crossed Europe and Africa, about 6,600 miles in all. Now it is down to the run into Dakar.

Two Schlesser buggies start the stage ahead of Masuoka, when they were supposed to start behind him. Masuoka chases. Trying to get past, he goes off the track and damages a rear wheel. His lead is gone.

Jean-Louis Schlesser, who won this rally the last two years, wins the stage. Then officials give him and his teammate a one-hour penalty for the early start.

That leaves Jutta Kleinschmidt of Germany at the top, in another Mitsubishi, with Andreas Schulz navigating. She is 38. She first raced the Dakar on a motorcycle. Two years earlier, she was the first woman ever on its podium, in third.

Her lead is about three minutes, with one short stage to go: 25 kilometers by the Pink Lake outside Dakar.

On January 21 she finishes it. She wins the Dakar by 2 minutes and 39 seconds over Masuoka, with Schlesser third.

"It's unbelievable," Kleinschmidt said.

"He lost the race yesterday. He made a mistake. I did not," she said.

She was the first woman to win the Dakar. Twenty five years later, she is still the only woman to win its car category.

Co-drivers and navigators: what is one call you made that kept your driver out of trouble?