RALLY DAKAR 2023

A 'crazed' Al-Attiyah wins the stage and endorses Sainz for two minutes

Nasser Al-Attiyah came out "lit" at the 374 kilometers of special that made up the fourth stage of the Dakar Rally after yesterday he saw how the FIA granted 11 more horsepower to the Audis to match their performance with the Toyotas and the BRXs .

The Qatari was not intimidated and took the stage victory, with a 1:57 advantage over Carlos Sainz, who was unable to take advantage of that extra performance with which the Audis started the special today. His mission: cut time to the leader. However, they have not succeeded...

Al-Attiyah, "like crazy"

They have not succeeded, firstly, because Nasser Al-Attiyah came out extra motivated to show that he is still the king of the Dakar. And faith that he has. "It was a tough stage, where we tried to push like crazy after the FIA decision to give the Audis more power. We pushed so much that we are very tired, but happy to have finished the day without problems."

Not only without problems, but he has also managed to increase his distance from Sainz (by almost two minutes) and also from a Peterhansel who in recent days has been more toned. The Frenchman has left today 3:44 with the current winner of the Dakar.

A very hard terrain... especially for the Audi

Both Peterhansel and Sainz today suffered from the hardness of the terrain, more 'stinking' than the other days with the presence of the always uncomfortable camel grass. A very physical scenario and, without a doubt, advantageous for Al-Attiyah, more adapted to these environments.

To top it off, the Audis entered a stage with compact, hard sand and very bumpy with an excessively hard suspension that made things very difficult for their drivers.

Sainz has suffered in his flesh the hardness of the stage since he has suffered neck and back pain after landing too abruptly in a compression: "It has been a very demanding stage for the body, with many potholes and camel grass. I think that I hurt my neck in a compression, with a very hard impact, let's see if the physio can fix me a bit because it was a very physical day. The suspension was perhaps a little too hard, but the stage was very demanding. There is still time, we must keep pushing."

Especially significant is the testimony of Stephane Peterhansel, who described today's stage as "one of the most difficult" in his (extensive) sporting career.

"The car was very hard today. Yesterday we changed the suspension, maybe the damper was not right or the ground was harder than we thought, but it was not pleasant at all. We had a lot of impacts on the back and neck. It was not not easy".

by Enrique Naranjo