Words by Afzal Rawuther
Bernhard ten Brinke finished stage eleven the fastest and notched up his first stage win of this year’s Dakar finishing 4 minutes 35 seconds ahead of Peugeot’s Cyril Despres. Despres’ teammates Sainz and Peterhansel rounded out the top four. Sainz leads the overall rankings ahead of teammate Peterhansel. The 281km timed special Belen-Fiambala-Chilecito stage saw the Spaniard Sainz gain a mere 10 seconds on Peterhansel in the general classification. Toyota’s Nasser Al-Attiyah and ten Brinke completed the stage in fifth and sixth respectively.
Toby Price, the 2016 champion, went on to win his first stage of the Dakar and finished 1 minute 38 seconds ahead of Honda’s Benavides. Price went on to move to the third position in the general classification after Joan Barreda retired from the Dakar a little before halfway through the stage. Walkner was only fifth fastest on the day and gave away 11 minutes to Price finishing 32 minutes over Benavides and 39 minutes ahead of Price. KTM privateer Gerard Farres is in fourth while Antoine Meo is in fifth.
Hero Motosports’ Oriol Mena finished ninth in the stage while his teammate CS Santosh finished 34th in the stage. The lone Sherco-TVS rider – Joan Pedrero finished eighth in the stage. In the trucks category, Frederico Villagra took the lead from Eduard Nikolaev who was leading since the second stage but surrendered more than fourty minutes in the stage eventually trailing Villagra by 16 minutes in the general classification.
Quad rookie Nicolas Caviglasso won his third stage of the Dakar while rally leader Ignacio Casale was 15 minutes off the pace. Ignacio Casale has an advantage of an hour and a half over his nearest competitor in the general classification. In the SxS category Patrice Garrouste won the stage with an advantage of over three minutes over the rally leader Reinaldo Varela. However, he still trails Varela by more than fourty minutes in the general classification.