Words by Afzal Rawuther
Toyota Gazoo’s Nasser Al-Attiyah won his third stage of this year’s Dakar finishing ahead of Peugeot’s Stephane Peterhansel by two minutes in the 523km section between Chilecito and San Juan. Rally leader Carlos Sainz finished 18 minutes off Nasser Al-Attiyah’s pace and that was enough for Peterhansel to inch closer to Sainz in the general classification. Sainz however still retains a 45 minute lead in the general classification and remains a strong favourite to clinch his second Dakar title. Toyota’s Giniel de Villiers finished third while Terranova in his X-Raid Mini finished fourth. de Villiers is now 20 minutes behind Al-Attiyah and 9 minutes behind ten Brinke in an all Toyota fight for the last position on the podium.
Meanwhile, in the trucks category, Eduard Nikolaev and Federico Villagra are now separated by only a second in the general classification after Ton Van Genugten won the stage with a lead of over four minutes over Martin Kolomy ahead of Nikolaev and Villagra who finished third and fourth respectively.
In the SxS category, rally leader Reinaldo Varela notched up another stage victory and now has a lead of more than an hour over his nearest rival. The stage was cancelled for bikes and quads and they head directly to the penultimate stage from San Juan to Cordoba.