Copiapó, the 7th January 2012

Stéphane Peterhansel, who holds the record for the highest number of Dakar wins, sits at the top of the 2012 event’s provisional leaderboard at the end of the first week of competition. The MINI/BFGoodrich driver is currently 11m22s clear of his team-mate Holowczyc, and 13m9s ahead of the USA’s Gordon.The heat at the foot of the last dune of the 2012 Dakar’s seventh stage, alongside tonight’s bivouac, was stifling. The wind blowing in from the Pacific coast blew sand onto our faces caked with sun cream and made the wait for the first cars particularly unbearable.Suddenly, a fluorescent orange machine could be seen cresting the sandy ridge in the distance, sparking off huge cheers from the spectators waiting near the finish. Robby Gordon drove down the long slope at full throttle, throwing up a plume of dust through the off-camber left-hand turn before the finish line. For a short while, the American was accredited with the fastest time. But not for long.In fact, the two Hummer H3 drivers rounded off the first week of competition with a welcome one-two finish on SS7, since Gordon’s team-mate Nasser Al-Attiyah, winner of the 2011 Dakar, went on to beat the American by 7m30s.Stéphane Peterhansel was third fastest, almost eight minutes down, but he wasn’t surprised by the speed of the Hummers: “Robby stopped with a puncture and I overtook him, but he soon passed me again and I couldn’t keep up with him. The Hummers’ long suspension travel gives it an advantage over our T1 prototypes on the open terrain we visited today