Photo of the day: Porsche 953 gets splashy on the Dakar

What we have here is a Porsche 953 - essentially a heavily modified 911 with a mechanical all-wheel drive system, lots of suspension travel and some very ballsy men behind the wheel. Porsche entered three 953s in the 1984 Paris-Dakar, its very first attempt at contesting the world's toughest rally.

This one, driven by French rallyists René Metge and Dominique Lemoyne, won the Dakar outright, beating into submission hundreds of other competitors. Including Jacky Ickx in one of the other 953s. As well as monstering the harshest desert conditions on the planet, the 953 was also, as you can see, rather partial to a quick dip in the wet stuff.

Porsche didn't win the Dakar again until 1986, after all three 959s it entered the previous year failed to finish. We suspect the 1-2 in 1986 made up for it. 

Anyone want to join the campaign to convince Porsche to enter a jacked-up 991 Turbo in next year's South American Dakar rally, then?