Former Dakar Rally champion in 2001 and 2002, and current second place rider in 2005, Fabrizio Meoni died on Tuesday, 11 January 2005, after a crash during a stage of the Dakar Rally, a day after his Spanish rival and friend José Manuel Pérez died from the injuries suffered three days earlier.
Meoni's incident happened during the 695-kilometer 11th special stage Atâr - Kiffa, in Mauritania territory. According to the reports by A.S.O. - organizer of the 2005 Rally Telefónica Dakar - Fabrizio Meoni fell down just a few minutes after passing checkpoint 1, located on the 175th kilometer of the stage. Medical and rescue teams were on the scene almost twenty minutes later, but despite prolonged resuscitation efforts, Meoni was pronounced dead of cardiac arrest.
A popular off road and rallying motorcycle racer, known by Italians as "The African", Fabrizion Meoni was 47-year old. He was born and lived in Castiglion Fiorentino, province of Florence, Italy, where he managed a motorcycle workshop. For more than 18 years he participated in African rallies on a KTM motorcycle, winning the Dakar Rally in 2001 and 2002, finishing 2nd in 1998 and 3rd in 1994 and 2003. The 2005 edition of the toughest desert rally in the world, was his 13th time competing in the Dakar Rally. He had already announced this was going to be his last. Amongst his international wins were the 1990 Incas Rally in Peru, the 1996 Desert Cannonball, four times in a row the Rally des Pharaons in Egypt, from 1998 to 2001 and four times the Tunisia Rally in 1997, 2000, 2001 and 2003.
R.I.P
