Agencies
Jeddah
As rain hit the Dakar Rally on Tuesday, Qatar’s Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah took the lead after Audi’s Carlos Sainz hit trouble on a shortened stage three in the Saudi Arabian desert.
The four-time winner Attiyah trailed Spaniard Sainz by two minutes and 12 seconds overnight but Sainz lost 45 minutes on repairs to the rear left suspension of his electric hybrid car during the run from Al Ula to Ha’il.
The 60-year-old triple Dakar champion then lost more time with navigational problems and dropped out of the top 10.
French driver Guerlain Chicherit won the stage for GCK Motorsport, ahead of Argentina’s Orlando Terranova for the Bahrain Raid Xtreme team and Overdrive Racing’s Saudi contender Yazeed Al Rajhi.
Attiyah leads Al Rajhi by 13 minutes and 19 seconds overall with 11 stages still to come before the rally ends in Dammam on Jan. 15.
The racing was cut short for safety reasons before the final checkpoint due to rainstorms preventing medical helicopters from flying, with competitors completing the journey to Ha’il by road.
Chicherit and Alex Winocq in their Prodrive Hunter recorded a memorable stage win by 3 mins 26 secs from the Toyota of South African Henk Lategan, with Argentinian Orly Terranova a close third on the day in his BRX Prodive Hunter.
From early morning, rain created pools of water along the 447km stage from Al Ula to Ha’il, creating extra challenges along an already demanding route passing through a series of canyons.
With the weather worsening as the leading cars reached the 378km mark, the race management decided it was no longer possible to guarantee competitor safety. The vehicles were halted and headed back to the bivouac in convoy, with the stage results at that point counting.
It meant a great turnaround in fortunes for Chicherit and Terranova in particular, and for the entire BRX team, following an almost unprecedented series of punctures which had dropped all four Prodrive Hunters from contention the previous day.
Also impressing on the day, despite two punctures, were Lithuanians Vaidotas Zala and Paulo Fiuza who recorded the seventh fastest stage time in their Prodrive Hunter.
Sebastien Loeb, the 2022 Dakar runner up, had set off eagerly looking to secure valuable points in the World Rally Raid Championship after his puncture problems 24 hours earlier.
The nine-time World Rally Champion had more bad luck when forced to stop for repairs to his BRX Hunter, losing 20 minutes, but was soon making up lost ground before the stage ended prematurely.
Partnered by Alex Winocq, Chicherit duplicated the form which brought an historic first victory for the Prodrive Hunter in the Rallye du Maroc in October.
Tackling his 15th Dakar after finishing fourth last year, Terranova produced another stirring recovery alongside Spaniard Alex Haro to underline the power of the Prodrive Hunter.
A delighted Chicherit said: It’s great. We were on a good pace without pushing especially hard, just keeping the same strategy that we had from the start of this rally.
“Sure it’s upsetting what happened yesterday, but now we’ve proved what we can do so we’ll stay focused and do the rally the way we planned by getting some good times, and some points for the World Rally Raid Championship.”
Zala commented: “That was a good day. We’re really happy with the car in the stage, trying to be careful in the rocky sections, but after some tweaks overnight we’ve turned a corner.”
Meanwhile, in the motorcycle category, 2020 champion Ricky Brabec -- the first American to win the endurance event -- retired after crashing and being taken to hospital for tests after suffering neck pain.
“The Honda rider has suffered a fall after 274 km of the special and is now in the hands of the Dakar medical team,” said organisers.
He was the second former motorcycle Dakar winner to retire from this year’s event after Britain’s reigning champion Sam Sunderland on Sunday.
