In 1985, Hervé Diers made his Dakar Rally debut in a Toyota Land Cruiser BJ46. In 2026, he’ll make his Dakar Classic debut in a Land Cruiser HZJ79, one that’s a bit different from the BJ46 and other Land Cruisers in the race: it’s actually a food truck that serves french fries.

Despite this quirk, it has Dakar Rally experience and still plenty of gas (literally and metaphorically) to race. Since it’s no longer legal for the Rally proper, he and his friend Alain Brousse are bringing the “fry stand” to the Classic instead.

The duo revealed their Dakar program at the Planet’Aire indoor playground in Aire-sur-la-Lys on Tuesday evening. They will compete as La Ch’ti Friterie (Team Ch’ti Friterie), which is the name of their french fry stand.

A baker by trade, Diers finished 63rd in the 1985 Paris–Dakar Rally with the journalist Gilles Navarro as navigator. The BJ46 had been prepared by Joseph Dequeker, a friend of race organizer Thierry Sabine; he paid for the car on credit since he barely had enough money to race, then sold team stickers in scrutineering to afford gas.

He continued to race Toyotas at Dakar on sporadic occasions throughout the 2000s. During the decade, Diers got his hands on the 200-horsepower HZJ79, which he converted into a food truck and appeared in the hit French movie Welcome to the Sticks (Bienvenue chez les Ch’tis).

While the film appearance certainly helped bring the truck into the mainstream, it is a legitimate business that sells fries and other foodstuff with a functioning deep fryer and the like. This has allowed Diers to cook for teams in the bivouac between stages, which he did at the 2009 Dakar Rally where he finished 59th. Of course, the kitchen equipment adds an extra 500 kilograms of weight to the car, to which Diers quipped it was basically an “anvil”.

Brousse became his co-driver for the 2014 race, placing 62nd overall. In 2018, the food truck finished third in T2 at the Africa Eco Race.

Diers and Brousse’s most recent Dakar was in 2020, which they did in a Can-Am Maverick instead and finished seventh in T3.

“The technical passport for the ‘fry stand’ no longer meets the new regulations (for the Dakar Rally), but it’s accepted for the Dakar Classic,” Diers commented. “It’s a shame, but I think we’ll be the darlings of the bivouac again, this time in the Classic.

“With the extra ton of weight, we’ve never been able to compete at the front, but we’ve always been Saint Bernards who help anyone in trouble. We were out of the running, but we still always managed to finish, and each time we won the ‘fry stand’ class.”

Team Ch’ti Friterie will donate €22 thousand to Secours Populaire Français, a Paris-based nonprofit focused on fighting poverty and discrimination, after the race. They will also organize a concert, BBQ, and ridealong in the food truck.

Featured image credit: Ch’ti Friterie