Al Duwadimi – Al Duwadimi stage 419km, liaison 297km
Lucas Moraes and Armand Monleon became the sixth different winner from seven stages in what turned out to be a chaotic stage from a timing point of view, hence the word “provisional” as standings could well change before the sun sets over Saudi Arabia.
The Brazilian said: “Yeah, to be honest, since we started so far behind, we were lucky because we definitely got all the tracks for us. So yeah, we didn’t have nothing to lose today, so we pushed a lot. And nice to win one more stage in the Dakar. These things are really hard to get, so happy to score some points for the championship as well. And got to keep fighting. I think now it’s going to be, maybe tomorrow it’s going to be just like this one today and then we’re going to start reaching the Empty Quarter. And there will be some strategy of course playing to not open the bigger one that we have there. But otherwise, so far so good and happy with the win.”
An official notice said “An incorrect road book note for km 158 of the special has caused several drivers at the front of the field to lose their bearings. A segment of about 20 km before and after this point will therefore be delimited at the finish of the car special at the bivouac in Al Duwadimi, erasing any gains or losses made in this part of the stage.”
Dakar leader Henk Lategan and Brett Cummings found the correct route and opened a gap while the others drove around in circles; Al Rajhi lost 14 minutes and Al Attiyah some 20 minutes, while the Toyota Gazoo Racing South Africa pair found themselves opening the road. Once the chasing pack found their tracks, he bled time to his closest rivals Yazeed Al Rajhi, Nasser Al-Attiyah and Mattias Ekstrom.
After the times had been adjusted, the 30-year-old South African’s lead was just 21 seconds ahead of Al Rajhi. They were, in essence severely penalized for not getting lost! “It’s a bit of a mess with the times. I’m not sure what’s going on. The official timing is showing something different. They took some of the section out of the stage. We’ll see what happens, we hope it doesn’t stay like this. It would be quite unfair because you cannot be penalized for finding the road first. It would not be right”, said Lategan.
At the time of writing, Moraes restored Toyota’s dominance, winning the stage by 7’41” from the Swedish Ford team of Mattias Ekstrom/Emil Bergkvist with Mitch Guthrie/Kellon Walch taking third in their M-Sport Raptor.
Nasser Al-Attiyah/Edouard Boulanger claimed fourth in their Dacia Sandrider on corrected time with Seth Quintero/Dennis Zenz racing their Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux to within 23 seconds of their Qatari rival.
Cristina Gutierrez/Pablo Moreno earned a top six finish in their Dacia, 12 minutes off the lead and 48 seconds ahead of Al Rajhi/Timo Gottschalk in their Overdrive Hilux.
Saood Variawa/Francois Cazalet scored another top 10 finish in their Toyota Gazoo South Africa Hilux, comfortably ahead of the Argentinian Juan Yacopini and his Spanish co-driver Daniel Oliveras in another Overdrive Toyota.
The Brazilian Marcelo Gastaldi and Adrien Metge were the top Century Racing finisher in tenth after Mathieu Serradori/Loic Minaudier- who ran as high as second at the 138km mark – suffered power steering problems and dropped back after stopping to top up with oil.
Ignoring the incorrect instruction at the halfway mark of the stage, the top ten teams had all started the day 16th or lower, while yesterday’s winner Grégoire de Mevius ended 14th after setting out first on the road. In the stage results, seven of the top ten started 11th or lower down the order.
Opening a stage on the Dakar Rally is not for the feint-hearted!
In the bike race, Australian Daniel Sanders maintained his grip on the overall standings with another stage win. The Australian master of the Dakar took his fifth stage win of the season and built up a comfortable lead for the rest of the race, 15′33″ ahead of his closest rival, Tosha Schareina: “It was pretty fast, very fast. Technical at the start, we had a lot of rain. But it was only at the start, so it was a pretty wet line to see in front and just had us kind of correct and not follow the mistakes with the navigation. The speed was good, head was good, so it was a much better day.”
In other news, Moraes was given a suspended disqualification after his co-driver accepted a cell phone from a random stranger for 43 seconds in the neutralization zone on stage five. The DQ Sword of Damocles was replaced with a one-hour penalty.
Autosport reports that Al-Attiyah is incensed by the FIA disqualifying Sainz and Loeb, and more so about his ten-minutes penalty for losing a spare wheel after the supporting cradle broke. Stating his intention to write a letter to the president of FIA Mohammed ben Sulayem about the sanction, he said: “I don’t understand it. To lose the tyres with the support [structure] and then the spectator finds the tyre with the support and you get ten minutes. I don’t accept it. “But I’m working to fix that whole problem because that’s not sport, we have to be fair. If I do it the wrong way and drop the tyres, OK, I get ten minutes penalty, but we didn’t realise, we have to be fair, but I will make a good letter to the [FIA] president, to avoid all that.”
Overall standings (provisional)
| 1 | H. Lategan/B. Cummings | Toyota Gazoo Racing SA Hilux | 37:13:08 |
| 2 | Y. Al Rajhi/T. Gottschalk | Overdrive Toyota Hilux | +0:21 |
| 3 | M. Ekstrom/E. Bergkvist | M-Sport Ford Raptor | +10:25 |
| 4 | N. Al-Attiyah/E. Boulanger | Dacia Sandrider | +21:57 |
| 5 | M. Guthrie/K. Walch | M-Sport Ford Raptor | +40:01 |
| 6 | M. Serradori/L. Minaudier | Century Racing CR7 | +54:20 |
| 7 | J. Yacopini/D. Oliveras | Overdrive Toyota Hilux | +1:13:05 |
| 8 | S. Quintero/D. Zenz | Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | +1:28:32 |
| 9 | J. Ferreira/F. Palmeiro | X-Raid Mini JCW | +1:58:25 |
| 10 | B. Baragwanath/L. Cremer | Century Racing CR7 | +2:07:38 |
