Luc Alphand clocked his second ever Dakar stage win on yesterday's tricky special between Bobo-Dioulasso and Bamako in his BFGoodrich-equipped BMW X5. Second fastest through the special was the Buggy of Jean-Louis Schlesser (Schlesser- Ford-BFGoodrich) but Stéphane Peterhansel (Mitsubishi-BFGoodrich), who was third fastest, still holds the lead 1h04m in the overall standings ahead of team-mate Hiroshi Masuoka.
The former downhill ski champion Luc Alphand, who has stolen fourth overall from team-mate Gregoire de Mevius (now fifth), commented: “That was a fun stage! And I'm pleased to have won it but I didn't drive for victory – I need to be careful, as I want to reach Dakar. But this was a nice victory for the team. We passed Jutta (Kleinschmidt) and gained on Peterhansel and for the last 20km we stayed behind him. There were some nice jumps over bridges – it was a bit like skiing! And Peterhansel was driving fast so it was good to be behind him. But that was quite a dangerous special. At some of the bridges you only had about 50cm either side of the car so you had to be really careful, especially if you were in someone's dust as it would have been easy to bang something but we had a great stage. And now I only have 48 stage victories to go to equal Vatanen!” Commenting on his second-placed finish on the special, Schlesser said: “That was enjoyable and I managed not to make any mistakes. I was behind Peterhansel and Masuoka but I couldn't do any better because of the dust. The next few days could decide the race as they are hard but anything can happen on this rally so we'll see. I hope to finish on the podium or better if things go my way – I know my car and tyres are good enough to make that happen.”
Andrea Mayer, Mitsubishi's third driver who acts as support for team-mates Peterhansel and Masuoka, clocked tenth fastest time, retaining her sixth spot in the overall standings in her BFGoodrich-clad Pajero.
Bruno Saby (Volkswagen-BFGoodrich) was fifth fastest on the special, his best stage finish to date on this year's event and holds onto his seventh position overall, with team-mate Jutta Kleinschmidt recording a sixth fastest time. Commenting from the bivouac, Matthew Stevenson, navigator for Bruno Saby, said: “We had a really clean run but we were taking it easy. There's no point in taking any risks as we can only really move up a place if someone ahead has a problem. Our T4 truck also rolled in that stage so we now have to be even more careful, especially over the next few stages, as we don't have any more support on the stage.”
After their adventures in the desert over the last few days, Nissan-BFGoodrich drivers Colin McRae and Ari Vatanen managed to plough their way through the dust of those running ahead of them on the road to record 13th and 14th fastest times on the stage. The lead Nissan driver Giniel de Villiers dropped some time simply through being stuck in a wake of dust. “That was a horrible stage. It was a really narrow track so you couldn't overtake. We got stuck behind a truck and it made so much dust we just had to sit at 20-30kph. If you were in the first few cars it will have been fine but after that it was impossible to really gain any time and it wasn't worth taking any risks,” said de Villiers.
Colin McRae also found it difficult running so far back on the road after finishing the last special so late. “That stage was quite dangerous in my opinion, although we had no problems. We drove about 75% of it blind in the dust. Hopefully tomorrow will be a bit better for us as we'll be running a bit further up the field and we can try and show what we, our cars and drivers are made of! A stage win will be difficult but ill keep pushing and do my best!”
BFGoodrich partners still dominate the leaderboard in the T1 category with Jean- Pierre Strugo (Mercedes-BFGoodrich) leading (15th overall) followed by Ukyo Katayama (Toyota-BFGoodrich) in 18th overall and Yoshio Ikemachi (Nissan- BFGoodrich) in third (23rd overall).
Like many of the frontrunners, current Dakar leader Stéphane Peterhansel also took today's special easily in his BFGoodrich-equipped Pajero. Thinking ahead to the next few days, the Frenchman said: “It was a short stage but we could easily have had an accident so we didn't want to take any risks. The race will continue seriously today with two marathon stages on Thursday and Friday (15-16 January). We might be leading but we have to stay calm to make it to Dakar in the leading spot. We're not allowed to make any mistakes now if we want victory.”
