Orlando Terranova
- November 10, 1979
- 45
- Argentina
- Dakar Rally
Orlando Terranova is an Argentinean rally driver who is most known for his participation at Dakar Rally. Since his debut in 2005, he participated twelve times in the world's toughest rally-raid race, two times in motorcycle category and ten times with cars. He was among the front-runners few times, finishing in the top 5 in 2013 and 2014.
Orlando Terranova
Multiple enduro champion in Argentina
Born in November 1979 in Mendoza, Argentina, Terranova started his racing career in 1997 as a motorcycle enduro rider. In following years, he collected four enduro championship titles in Argentina and finished in the 2001 Latin American enduro championship.
He made a debut at Dakar Rally in 2005 edition, which started on December 31, 2004, in Barcelona, Spain. He was driving KTM, not reaching the finish. Two years later, in an event which started in Portugal, his result was the same.
Terranova joined German X-Raid team in 2009
2009 - first Dakar Rally in a car
In 2009, when Dakar Rally has been moved to South America, with the start and finish in Argentina, Terranova made a switch to car category, driving a BMW X3 for X-Raid team. He didn't reach the finish again. In 2010, driving a Mitsubishi Racing Lancer, he finally ended Dakar Rally for the first time, taking the ninth place.
He recorded two more DNFs in 2011 and 2012, driving BMW X3 and Toyota Hilux. Rejoining X-Raid for the third time in 2013 and driving BMW X3 again, Terranova scored his best result by finishing fifth. He also won one stage in that event.
Orlando Terranova was driving Mini for the first time at 2014 Dakar Rally
Fifth place as the best finish at Dakar Rally
In 2014, X-Raid team gave him a Mini All4 Racing and he repeated fifth-place finish, without stage wins. In 2015, he was the stage winner four times but ended an event in the 18th place because he lost a time when rolled on the second stage.
In 2016, Terranova slightly improved his performance, finishing 12th. In 2017, in his fourth participation with Mini, he finished in the sixth place. In 2018, after facing lots of problems, he finished in 20th place with X-Raid's Mini John Cooper Works Rally.
Photos: Florent Gooden/DPPI/X-Raid,
