The Briton brought out the heavy artillery on the penultimate stage of this Dakar 2022, which he completed in second position behind the title holder, Kevin Benavides. Frenchman Adrien van Beveren fell to fourth place overall.
The loop around Bisha covered today by the competitors constituted the penultimate stage of this third edition of the Dakar in Saudi Arabia, but the last major one, while the final scheduled for tomorrow will only be 164 kilometers long.
In this sense, the gaps widened today and the established hierarchy should be difficult to call into question tomorrow, even if the History of the rally-raid classic recommends us to be cautious about the results we take for granted.
A final stage of tricky scope
Today, the entrants therefore had to risk themselves on a 345 km long special, half made up of dunes, thus representing a big challenge for the bikers and requiring rigorous navigation so as not to find themselves disoriented while navigating in a very hilly stage, where nothing resembles an erg more than another.
In these conditions Toby Price, winner of his first stage yesterday, quickly gave way to his opponents. Therefore Matthias Walkner emerged in the lead at the first check-in, at kilometer 43, 24 seconds ahead of Sam sunderland and 47 on Pablo Quintanilla.
Enough to put the Austrian back in the race for final victory, he who was somewhat messy yesterday at the end of his navigation. Nevertheless, and even if he denies it, it is difficult not to think that it was more of a tactic to go behind today and thus not open the road, rather than a real error .
Sunderland regains control in the general
Same thing for Sunderland, who after a lackluster performance yesterday showed great pace to take the lead of the stage at kilometer 127. The winner of the 2017 edition was then just eight seconds ahead of his closest pursuing, Kevin Benavides, who despite his retirement from yesterday's special was able to restart in Rally2.
Enough nevertheless to already regain the lead of the general from the French Adrien van Beveren, who started today in fourth position in the starting order, and who therefore lost a lot of time in recognizing the track.
The trend then strengthened over the miles, with Sunderland consolidating their lead over their main rivals in the title race. Halfway through the race, the GasGas driver showed a lead of 4'44 over Walkner, and relegated Quintanilla to 7'17 and Van Beveren to 18'41.
Stage victory for Benavides
The Englishman nevertheless lost by only four unfortunate seconds in the final stages against Benavides, the final winner of the stage, the Argentinian who demonstrated his resourcefulness after his disappointments the day before.
Joaquim Rodrigues for his part, produced a superb performance by finishing the stage on the podium, in third position ahead of Walkner, while we then had to go down to sixth place to find Quintanilla, at 7'40, and to 15th to find Van Beveren, at 21'33.
We will also note the 17th place of Danilo Petrucci, who continues to do the job and is about to see the end of his first Dakar, a real feat for the ex-MotoGP rider, who currently occupies 72nd position overall.
Van Beveren has not said his last word
All these results are of course not without general consequences. Van Beveren thus loses the leadership, which falls again into the hands of Sunderland. The Northerner even got off the provisional podium and is now 15'30 behind the Briton.
Even if it will be very difficult to make up for more than a quarter of an hour of delay on the last special scheduled for tomorrow, we can bet that the French will be able to make the best use of their advantageous position in the starting order to play their part. everything and why not beat everyone to the post on this 44th edition of the Dakar! Everyone, that is to say Sunderland, of course, but also the drivers inserted between him and the Briton, namely Quintanilla and Walkner. To do this, Van Beveren certainly only has the 164 kilometers remaining to travel between Bisha and Jeddah tomorrow, but impossible is not French!
