Saudi Al-Rajhi loses by dropping 53 minutes… and the Russians excel in the truck category
The Swedish driver, Matthias Ekström, won the eighth stage of the car category in the Dakar Rally Saudi Arabia 2022. This victory is the first for the Swedish driver in a stage of the Dakar Rally, and the second for Audi this year.
Ekström finished the eighth stage, 49 seconds ahead of his French colleague Stephane Peterhansel, while the French BRX driver Sebastien Loeb was third, 3 minutes 8 seconds behind the leader, and Spanish Audi driver Carlos Sainz finished fourth, 3 minutes 11 seconds behind. In front of Toyota’s South African driver Henk Latigan, who finished fifth, 3 minutes 20 seconds behind.
With these results, Sebastian Loeb reduced the lead that separates him from the leader Nasser Al-Attiyah, who finished the stage in eleventh place, to 37:58 minutes. The Saudi driver, Yazeed Al-Rajhi, also lost time, and finished the stage in tenth place, 53:19 minutes behind Al-Attiyah in the standings. general category.
The “KAMAZ” team continued to dominate the truck category, and its drivers achieved the first four places in the eighth stage. The Russian Dmitry Sotnikov achieved the fastest time in the eighth stage, clocking 3 hours 56 minutes and 42 seconds, ahead of his colleague and compatriot Andrei Karginov, who finished second by 3 minutes and 11 seconds. Their colleague Eduard Nikolaev finished third with a difference of 6 minutes 11 seconds, and Anton Shebalov was fourth by 8 minutes 58 seconds.
With this result, Dmitriy Stunikov maintained his lead in the general classification, leading by 11 minutes and 25 seconds, ahead of his colleague Eduard Nikolaev in third place by 40 minutes and 23 seconds.
British “Gas Stony Cove” rider Sam Sunderland regained the lead in the provisional general classification for the motorcycle category, following winning the eighth stage of the Dakar Rally Saudi Arabia 2022, which was held on Monday morning from Dawadmi to Wadi Al-Dawasir with a length of 830 km, including 394 km for the special timed stage.
This victory is the sixth for the Gas Gas team this year in the eight stages of the Dakar Rally, so far, and Sunderland scored 3 hours, 48 minutes and two seconds, which secured him the first place in the stage, and he advanced over the Chilean Honda rider Pablo Quintanya by two minutes and 23 seconds, while a cyclist came ” Red Bull KTM’s Austrian Matthias Walkner finished third, 4 minutes 11 seconds behind, while the other American Honda driver Ricky Brabec finished fourth by 6 minutes and 44 seconds, and the young American “Bass KTM” driver Mason Klein came in fifth, with a difference of 5 8 minutes and 8 seconds.
While the French Yamaha rider, Alexandre Giroud, finished the eighth stage of the Saudi Dakar Rally 2022 in first place, enhancing his lead in the general classification of the category, following his main American chasing, Pablo Coppetti, lost more than 12 minutes during this stage.
Giroud clocked 5:2:8sec, just 48 seconds ahead of Marcelo Medeiros’s Brazilian rider, while American Del Amo-Yamaha’s Pablo Copetti finished third by 12:26, followed by Poland’s Orlin rider Kamil Wisniewski in fourth place. With a difference of 16 minutes and 53 seconds, Argentine Francesco Moreno came in fifth, with a difference of 22 minutes and 18 seconds.
Polish driver Marek Gottshal set the fastest time in the eighth stage of the light desert vehicles category of commercial production “T4” in the Dakar Rally Saudi Arabia 2022.
Marek scored 4 hours, 36 minutes and 14 seconds, taking the lead in the category, two minutes and 48 seconds ahead of his brother, Michel Gottchall, who came in second, while the American Austin Jones finished third, by 8 minutes and 10 seconds, to top the overall ranking of the category by a difference. 6 minutes 38 seconds from Spaniard Gerard Varese, who finished the stage in fourth place, following savoring the taste of victory yesterday thanks to the penalty imposed on the Polish driver Aaron Domzala following the end of the seventh special stage.
The American Red Bull Offroad driver Seth Quintero scored his eighth victory in a stage of the rally this year; He set the fastest time in the eighth stage in the T3 desert light model vehicle category, which is the sixth consecutive win for the American youth this year.
Quintero clocked 4 hours 17 minutes 14 seconds, ahead of the young Swedish South Racing driver Sebastian Ericsson by 11 minutes 57 seconds, while the Russian MSK driver Pavel Lebedev finished third by 12 minutes and 32 seconds.
Chilean South Racing driver Francesco Lopez Contardo finished fourth, 17 minutes behind, to continue his lead in the provisional category, ahead of Sweden’s Sebastian Ericsson by one hour and 19 minutes.
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