Qatari Nasser Al-Attiyah was surprised by the support he received from spectators as he won the opening stage of the Dakar Rally in Argentina.
Al-Attiyah beat pre-race favourite Carlos Sainz into second place as the rally made its first visit to South America because of security fears in Senegal.
"I have never seen so many people around a race," the Qatari prince affirmed.
"There were more spectators than we are used to having in the World Rally Championship. Thank God the crowd was well controlled and we had no problems."
He added: "It was a fairly easy route, but still quite fast. However, it didn't feel like I had to push it to the limit during the race."
Al-Attiyah, who completed the distance between Buenos Aires and Santa Rosa with his BMW in two hours, 36 minutes and 15 seconds, added: "Driving with so much passion around you it's great."
Sainz admitted he spend most of the stage trying to pass main rival Stephane Peterhansel.
"I was behind him about 250 kilometres. The truth is it was impossible to pass him." the VW Touareg driver said.
Peterhansel, nine-time Dakar Rally champion, ended in sixth place in his Mitsubishi.
Meanwhile, Spaniard Marc Coma completed a brilliant opening day and won the motorcycle category first stage in a time of 2:46:17 on his KTM.
"The main difficulty was in the mileage. I decided to be prudent, something strange in this kind of stage but that was the best," Coma said.
In fact, Coma took advantage of a puncture to Cyril Despres' motorcycle as the French rider lost more than 40 minutes.
Coma completed the stage with a comfortably lead of 22 minutes over Poland's Jacek Czachor.
The Dutch crew of Marcel van Vliet, Herman Vaanholt and Gerard van Veenedaak secured the truck stage win in a Ginaf with a time of 3:15:07.
Sunday's second stage will see the competitors go from Santa Rosa to Puerto Madryn and will cover 837km, of which 237km will be timed.