RALLY DAKAR 2022

Al-Attiyah beat Sainz by 12s and leads Dakar 2022 prologue in cars

The Dakar 2022 arrived with the prologue, a trip from Jedá to Ha’il with an estimated period of only 19 km, in the early morning hours of this first day of the year. Among the cars, Nasser Al-Attiyah put Toyota at the front and secured the advantage of starting in the lead in the opening special, on the morning of the 2nd.

Brian Baragwanath and Henk Lategan tied the exact time: 11min32s, and were, in that order, third and fourth. Only 1s slower, Sébastien Loeb was fifth.

Yazeed Al-Rajhi, Nani Roma, Giniel de Villiers, Jakub Przygonski and Orlando Terranova completed the top-10. The current champion and biggest winner of the Dakar, Stéphane Peterhansel, finished 14th. Brazilian duo Marcelo Gastaldi/Cadu Sachs was 24th, but only 1min31s slower than Al-Attiyah.

TRUCKS

Kamaz follows the absolute domination of trucks in recent years: the first four placed in the prologue were drivers with vehicles of the Russian brand. Eduard Nikolaev completed the 19km in 13min01s and finished in the lead. That's how he leaves for the Sunday special.

The four hands of Kamaz were separated by just 27s. Dmitry Sotnikov was second, Andrey Karginov and Anton Shibalov were close behind.

The truth is that the difference was not so different from the others. The tenth-place finisher finished 48s short of Nikolaev's time only. Ignacio Casale, Gert Huzink, Janus van Kasteren, Martin Macik, Martin van den Brink and Pascal de Baar finished the top-10.

UTVs

In UTVs, the top-5 had three Poles. Including the leader of the prologue, Marek Goczal, who completed the stretch in 13:22s. His brother Michal Goczal finished 14s behind and placed second in the family opening category.

Brazilian Rodrigo Luppi, with navigator Maykel Justo, finished the journey only 18s slower than Marek Goczal and third. Already in fourth was Austin Jones, who has Gustavo Gugelmin as navigator.

Aron Domzala was fifth place and had Molly Taylor, David Zille, Luis Portela Morais, Gert-Jan van der Valk and Jeremy Poret closing the top-10.

Among the lightweight prototypes, Seth Quintero won the prologue.

The 44th edition of the Dakar has its first official special on Sunday, with an internal stretch of 333 km in Ha’il.

Autonews