Robby Gordon said Monday the cancellation of the Dakar Rally cost him approximately $4.5 million, and he disagreed with the decision not to race at least a portion of the event.

Gordon, who won stages of the race the past three years and led the event in 2005, was in Portugal and preparing for the start when organizers canceled it because of “direct” threats of terrorism from al-Qaida-linked militants.

Gordon said his team had built two cars for the event and had more than $1 million invested in each vehicle.

“I’m extremely disappointed,” he said. “I can completely understand their decision not to go to Mauritania or not want to put competitors in an awkward or dangerous situation. That I understand 100 percent, but for them — with as many years as they’ve been doing this rally — not to have a backup plan. They just had no Plan B.”

About 550 competitors were scheduled to start Saturday the 16-day, 5,760-mile trek through remote and hostile dunes and scrub from Europe to Senegal in west Africa.

Organizers of the rally cited warnings from the French government about safety after the al-Qaida-linked Dec. 24 slaying of a family of French tourists in Mauritania — where eight of the competition’s 15 stages were to be held — and “threats launched directly against the race by terrorist organizations.”

It was the first time that the 30-year-old rally, one of the biggest competitions in automobile racing, has been called off.

Gordon said he believed the race course could have been altered, perhaps running to Morocco or back, or staying on the course in Portugal.

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