François Flick, a veteran of the Dakar Rally on a bike saddle and navigator’s seat, died Monday evening at the age of 59 in a car accident in Bizenuille, France. The accident occurred when the sports car he and his friend Brumo Lamy were driving went off the road and into a tree, killing both.
Flick raced the Dakar Rally on a Honda 400 XR from 1998 to 2005. In his debut race, he won the opening stage running from Paris to Narbonne. He scored three top-ten overall finishes with a best run of seventh in 2000, followed by a tenth in 2003 and ninth the next year.
While 2005 was his final Dakar as a bike rider, he eventually became the co-driver of a SMG buggy developed and driven by Le Mans veteran Philippe Gache that finished eighth in the 2008 Central Europe Rally, which replaced the Dakar Rally following its cancellation for that year. The Dakar was eventually moved to South America and Flick rejoined Gache for 2015, though they failed to finish.
Outside of racing, Flick ran an armoury and cutlery at the Boulevard de Courtais in Montluçon, which was founded by his father in 1948.
His son Xavier Flick has followed in his footsteps, running the Dakar Rally in 2021. After the news of his father’s death, Xavier withdrew from the ongoing Rallye du Maroc to return to France.
