LOEB EATS INTO DAKAR LEAD

Sebastien Loeb started off the second week of Dakar 2022 strong, taking the Stage 7 win and eating into the margin of Toyota’s Nasser Al-Attiyah.

The Prodrive BRX Hunter driver set a blistering pace in the sandy terrain out of Riyadh to complete the 402km special over 5 minutes faster than the rest of the field. Despite some concerns at the end of the stage.

“We had a fantastic special until 50 kilometres before the line, when we started having engine problems. It just sputtered on, off and on again…” said Loeb.

“We lost a lot of time near the end, but we still came out on top, so no complaints from my side.”

“We’re not in a position of strength, there are no questions to be answered. There is no strategy. We’ll just do our job and see how it plays out.”

Unfortunately for Loeb, Al-Attiyah was still the second-fastest through the stage, and while his margin in the overall standings was reduced, he is still 45 minutes ahead of the Frenchman with five stages left to run.

Audi made a concerted effort over the rest day to get on top of the teething issues with their new Audi RS Q e-tron, particularly the suspension failures. And it seemed to pay dividends with Carlos Sainz and Stephane Peterhansel third and fourth fastest through the stage.

The two are well and truly out of contention in the overall standings but are pushing hard to develop the new car ready for a return in 2023.

In the battle for the final spot on the podium, the Overdrive Toyota squad is well situated, with teammates Yazeed Al Rajhi and Lucio Alvarez comfortably third and fourth in the overall standings. An hour off the front running pace and fifth and seventh respectively, on today’s stage.

“It’s a special day when you open the road, but Michael did an outstanding job.” said Al Rajhi.

“We stayed focused and, although we suffered a flat, I’m happy with the result. We were a bit unlucky, but we were also fortunate to finish high up.”

“We were unable to catch Séb, but tomorrow is another day, we’ll be starting in a different position and we’ll try again.”

“I would love to be in contention for the top honours, but on the first day we all lost 40 minutes looking for a waypoint that Nasser found straight away.”

“He now has a 50-minute lead, so we need him to concede 40 minutes for the rest of us to have a chance! Our goal is to fight for second place.”

“I’ve got a fine car, a fine co-driver, the roadbook is great, so is the rally and so is the weather, everything is perfect!”

Jakub Przygonski in the X-Raid Mini holds fifth, 1.5 hours off the pace. Ahead of Stage 6 winner Orlando Terranova in the second Prodrive BRX Hunter.

SSV

Molly Taylor continued her fight back – Image: Red Bull

In the SSV class, Australian Molly Taylor continued her fightback in the overall standings after issues on the fourth stage of Dakar 2022. 

The Can-Am factory driver was 12th on Stage 7 to move up to 13th in the class overall. Having moved up 30 places in just three stages.

However, Taylor still has plenty of work ahead of her to continue her progress up the leaderboard as she is still five hours off the pace of her teammates Austin Jones and Gerard Farres, who lead the class and an hour and a half away from a top ten result.

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