DAKAR 2024

Sainz and Cruz give an exhibition where the rest only survives

Stages like today are those that expand the legend of a giant like Carlos Sainz. He missed the stage victory due to the push of a newcomer like Guillaume De Mevius and the brand new, evolved Toyota Hilux, but that doesn't mean it stops being a true display of driving... and grit, dealing with the dust that so much I feared up to three punctures yesterday.

Despite starting behind thirteen vehicles from the Challenger category, an SSV and practically all the T1 +, the Matador has been able to not only pass more than 20 cars on the stage (with enough dust to make it even more difficult), but also, to do so at a pace much higher than their rivals for victory.

A stage to remember...Sainz finished second just 1:44 behind the winner and first leader of the race, but the most important thing is that he regains the confidence that he could have lost after yesterday's bad prologue and, above all, that He has given a good score to the three greats of the Dakar: 21 to Sébastien Loeb, 23 to Nasser Al-Attiyah, more than half an hour to Peterhansel. The two minutes lost yesterday remain an anecdote in the face of such a display of power.

The stage had two very different halves. The first part was faster and more fluid, which has been good for the Spaniard to pass as many cars as possible and a second, on the scree, in which he had to risk more. Sainz did it more than, for example, Mattias Ekström, who recognized that perhaps he had gone "too slow" in that area (where he suffered a puncture). In fact, he left a good part of the 14:20 that separated him from De Mevius there.

Al-Attiyah was unable to set his usual pace due to two early punctures that ruined the stage. Loeb had all kinds of problems: with the radio, another puncture at the start that forced him to slow down and even a broken steering arm that had to be repaired and Peterhansel, gentlemanly as always, admitted that he had not had his day: It just wasn't fast enough.

Faced with this general disaster, the giant figure of the Spaniard... with more puncture problems than the rest!!: "It has been a hard day, with a lot, a lot of dust at the beginning. Then I had a slow puncture, then another and then a third that forced us to put the tire back on the slow puncture. We lost a lot of time there and it's a shame, but in the end it was a positive day," he summarized at the finish line.

by Enrique Naranjo