Thursday, April 26, 2012

Dakar 2012 - Stage 10

Iquique to Arica, covering 694km.  The last stage in Chile, before heading into Peru.

Casteu losing some 30 minutes right at the start of the stage when his bike gave engine troubles again.  Not a great race for him this year.  Goncalves also had to make up some time as he changed his engine and got the 15 minute penalty.  He did well, until the first checkpoint when he had engine trouble with the Husqvarna and that pushed him back into 7th place.

Bort did again did exceptionally well, winning the stage, by catching up with Coma and Despres and staying with them.  He also got an injury when he twisted his leg badly, but even this didn't slow him down.  He won the stage, beating Coma by 00:01:32.  Well done mate!

So, Rodrigues still hasn't changed his engine, but with Casteu's Yamaha giving him issues, they're probably starting to think about doing that now.  Viladoms also hasn't changed his engine on the KTM and that's allowed him to move into the top 5.  Stage top 5 goes to Bort, Coma, Despes, Rodrigues and Viladoms, respectively.

Overall, Despres leads Coma by only 21 seconds!  This is going to be an awesome battle.  3rd, 4th and 5th goes to Rodrigues, Viladoms and Svitko respectively.

No comments:

Post a Comment