Dacia Sandriders has suffered yet more disappointment on the Dakar Rally as Nasser Al-Attiyah lost over half an hour on stage four, which was won by Yazeed Al Rajhi.
Having already lost Sébastien Loeb and Fabian Luruqin to mandatory disqualification following their crash on the previous stage – although the team appealed the decision – Dacia still had a place on the virtual podium before Al-Attiyah was forced to replace a wheel after 92km.
The five-time Dakar winner then had to stop after 188km, waiting for the third Sandrider of Cristina Gutiérrez and Pablo Moreno Huete to assist with extensive repairs.
Al-Attiyah, who had started the stage sitting in third overall, has now dropped towards the rear of the top 10, some 33 minutes down on Al Rajhi and 35 minutes adrift of overall leader Henk Lategan in seventh.
Al-Attiyah had been running third overall when trouble struck early into the stage
Dacia’s technical director Philip Dunabin said: “Nasser has had what appears to be a failure of the outer ball joint, on the lower wishbone at the rear, so this is the part holds the bottom arm to the upright assembly and it’s a part where we’ve had no history of failures.
“But, in Cristina’s fortunate role of backing up Nasser, she has some spare parts in her car; they are parts that you don’t normally carry in the car but since we had the right part, Cristina, Pablo, Nasser and Edouard were able to put the car back together and continue in the stage.”
In the overall classification, Al Rajhi trimmed Lategan’s lead to just under seven minutes while M-Sport Ford’s Mattias Ekström moved into the podium position following Al-Attiyah’s troubles.
Ekström’s M-Sport team-mate Mitch Guthrie Jr had been set to finish third on the stage to move into fourth overall, but a five-minute penalty was applied to the American driver after the finish, dropping him to sixth.
The 415km stretch from Al Henakiyah to AlUla was the first leg of the marathon stage and was largely dominated by Toyota and Ford, with notable performances from Century Racing’s trio of Brian Baragwanath, Mathieu Serradori and Marcelo Gastaldi.
Although similar to the 48-hour chrono, whereby crews must camp at a remote bivouac with outside technical assistance, the marathon differs from the chrono due to the stage classification setting the road order for stage five. The marathon also follows the same format as the regular stages by awarding W2RC stage points.
Behind Al Rajhi and Lategan on the stage, Juan Cruz Yacoopini showcased the prowess of the Hilux, with the third quickest time, while Martin Prokop was fourth in his Orlen Jipocar Ford Raptor.
Serradori ended up sixth quickest, nearly 19 minutes behind Al Rajhi despite a 20-second speeding penalty, with Baragwanath confirming the Century’s pace two minutes further back.
A five-minute speeding penalty prevented Guthrie Jr from taking third on stage
Overall Classification (after stage 4)
1 Henk Lategan/Brett Cummings (Toyota Gazoo Racing) 23h36m24s
2 Yazeed Al Rajhi/Timo Gottschalk (Overdrive Racing Toyota) +6m54s
3 Mattias Ekström/Emil Bergkvist (M-Sport Ford) +21m40s
4 Mathieu Serradori/Loïc Minaudier (Century Racing CR7) +30m25s
5 Lucas Moraes/Armand Monleon (Toyota Gazoo Racing) +33m25s
6 Mitch Guthrie Jr/Kellon Walch (M-Sport Ford) +34m09s
7 Nasser Al-Attiyah/Edouard Boulanger (Dacia Sandriders) +35m53s
8 Juan Cruz Yacopini/Dani Oliveras Carreras (Overdrive Racing Toyota) +41m10s
9 João Ferreira/Filipe Palmeiro (X-raid Mini JCW) +1h11m07s
10 Urvo Männama/Risto Lepik (Overdrive Racing Toyota) +1h17m36s
