After have done the Tuareg Rallye three times, my brother "Åmme" and myself have decided to enter Rally Mongolia in 2013. He lives in Ulan Baator and is waiting for his Berg 570 Rallye to arrive. I have not yet decided if shipping my CRF450X Rally or if renting is the best option. Would be nice hear from any inmate that have done the rally and/or is planning to do it in 2013. I have seen the video from 2010 when Jonah and the Mikes did it. A few questions to start with: Are the road books in English? Accuracy of RB? Any GPS navigation with WP?
Mike: Hello. Roadbooks were good, in english and japanese. The organizers are Japanese, the hosts are Mongolian, then things get translated into english....we got through fine Tip: Find an rally entrant that speaks Japanese and English and become good friends fast. In addition to the roadbook, they loaded GPS waypoints every 20-30k or so. Just enough GPS info to tell if you were heading off in the wrong direction, but you still had to ride the roadbook as you primary navigation. I rented a 640 enduro from Gantulga at KTM Tours Mongolia:gantulga@ktmtour.mn http://www.ktmtour.mn/ He picked us up at the airport, arranged hotels and serviced the bike along the way. Totally turn key. Rally Mongolia Pics Here Any other questions, fire away.
A few more questions: - How about food? How was the supply from the organizers? Do recommend to bring like "Adventure Packs" and a mini burner to cook your own dinner? We use to do that at the Tuareg as your were arriving in late afternoon and dinner was served at 9:00 PM. Access to drinking water? - How would you describe the course/track? Was it any really long tough stages with dunes and soft sand? - I saw on the DVD that some riders arrived after dark, do you need to bring a good LED-light to put on the helmet?
As my brother mentioned we done three Tuareg or more correct I have started three times but only completed two of them. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o> Training or a fool's way to his life dream.<o></o> <o></o> Started this year’s Tuareg with the ambition to achieve a Top 5 position to reach the target I knew that I sometimes needed to ride above my skill limit, well it didn’t really work out as planned.<o></o> Over and out at stage 1 A quick casting in Morocco Good insurance coverage provided a medical jet back to Sweden The plan is to wright about the journey back from the injury after the mistake at Tuareg there the goal is to be at the start of Rally Mongolia 8<SUP>th</SUP> of August 2013. Together with my brother as his Tuareg didn’t went as planned either, due to my accident as he stayed with me after the crash waiting for the medical team to arrive. ORGA gave him time back the day after still you lose some focus after a happening like this. On the second day he made a high speed crash and joined me in the medicalroom for a few stiches in right hand, third day he blow the engine on the red one luckely it there a Husaberg available for the rest of the race. The injury well I don’t know the medical terms but the lower knee-joint there crushed, but the doctor made as per my knowledge his best to fix it with the help of some plates and screws and under heavy influence of drugs under the first month the healing process started. <o></o> Some metall I there not allowed to put any weight on the joint for the first 8 weeks, but important to bend and stretch the leg as much as possible, in the middle of this treatment I there scheduled to move to Ulaanbaatar to start a new job well I needed to postpone the move a couple of weeks but finally 4 weeks after surgery I landed Ulaanbaatar.<o></o> After 8-10 weeks all hardware there healed and I could now focus on the software who there down to Microsoft 1.0 beta strength, did a lot of training with rubber band etc. but no real progress. Finally in August I came to the conclusion that pain has to be treated with pain and I entered the local gym. TBC
Mike: Food was supplied, all made with bottled water. I didn't have any stomach issues the whole time....Noodles, rice, and some lamb meat things i couldn't identify, but ate a lot of. Drinking water was provided, all from bottles. I wouldn't worry about bringing a stove set up. I would bring snacks and stuff to add to the lunch packs that were provided. I never finished after dark, but some folks did, just a bike headlight would be good, a helmet light may be overkill. The track was wonderful, a few sand days, but nothing too horrible. Lots of beautiful tow track and a good mix of rock washes and desert. A handful of riders were on 250cc bikes and pulled through it all. We saw camels, goats, yaks, cows for miles.....not a single fence, just open range land and great views.
Hej, I did the rally in 2006. A lot was lost to us due to the language barrier. The provided interpreters were horrible. So we missed lots of updates and route changes. The food was descent but I would recomend to bring more food that you would eat for breakfast. Unless you like eating just rice and a few others things put in. I think they were meat like objects . Obviously bring the usual energy bars and energy powders. The road book was in English and French with horrible drawings. So navigation is "normal". I think I would just rent a bike there instead of shipping your bike over. I sent mine over and the cost was very expensive for the shipping to and from. The terrain was breathtaking and the course not very difficult. Lycka till, hej da.
Did some investigating about available bikes in Ulaanbaatar today and found following for sale: Yamaha 450 Meca Dakar bike in very nice condition KTM 500 Rally light KTM 450 Rally light Honda CRF 450 X A few XR This is good news and give us some options if shipping or renting don't work, and if brother pay the bill I don't mind to have a spare practice bike if so I would recommend the Yamaha.
Another thing I just remembered; my GPS was the Garmin 276 C and we couldn't upload anything to it from their computers. The more poular smaller GPS units were fine.
Thanks Brocku, we will use the Garmin 60 series I noticed that majority of riders used the same this year.
2013 Rally Mongolia now official Still a nighmare to understand cost etc. http://www.sser.org/rallymongolia/
I managed to get to this site http://www.sser.org/rallymongolia/index_2_encyclopedia.html seams to be useful.
Been around to all know shops with offroad gear and it's a few bikes available in the last one I found a second Yamaha pre 2007 with steel frame fully equiped and a KTM 660 Rally. Well to make a long story short, we now have a KTM 660 Rally in the family as compliment to the 570 Rally and the deal is that the brother highest in the final result in the rally will be the official owner of the 660.