Stage 9 - the story of the leaders.
author: Leon Botha
Stage 9 - the story of the leaders.
The start of Stage 9 of the 2010 Dakar Rally was delayed yesterday morning by four hours as the medical helicopters could not fly in the dense fog surrounding the coastal area.
The stage was then shortened to 178km to allow the 'battlers' more time to get back to the bivouac at the end of the day. Only 68 of the original 128 cars started the stage.
The very difficult stage consisted of desert sand and what seemed like endless dunes only.
The early lead belonged to Stéphane Peterhansel but later on he got stuck between two patches of Camel grass and lost 10 minutes due to what he claimed to have been a silly driver's error.
At the 71km mark Nasser Al-Attiyah of the Volkswagen team took the lead and he was followed by Chicherit in a BMW.
The worst luck amongst the leaders befell 6th placed in the general standings, Krzysztof Holowczyc (Nissan) who seemed to have withdrawn from the race with a broken his rear axle. He left the special to try and repair it at the 68-km point, without success for the moment. As if that wasn’t bad enough, his assistance team passed by without seeing him and is currently around the 100-km mark of the special stage.
This bad luck brings an end to another world class performance by the South African built Nissan team and it is sad to see that we failed to get a good result again this year.
At CP1, 117km into the stage, the four race Touaregs were in the lead with Nasser Al-Attiyah leading, Giniel de Villiers (South Africa) second, Carlos Sainz third and Mark Miller in fourth place. However, Chicherit, running far back on road was not accepting any of this and he broke the VW dominance by taking the fastest time.
At the stage finish Chicherit fell back to fourth place with the first three VW’s home Al-Attiyah, Sainz and De Villiers.
Today – Tuesday, 12 January 2010 - Special Stage 10 from La Serena to Santiago (Chile) will consist of a 112 km liaison section followed by a 238km Special Stage and then 236 km of Liaison which means the section will be 586 km long.
The teams will leave the Atacama, the hills of Chile and the dunes behind as the surroundings will change drastically along the much twistier tracks on the way to Santiago.
The gravel roads will however suit Carlos Sainz and Nasser Al-Attiyah to a tee as they are quite used to the WTC type of roads.
STANDINGS AFTER STAGE 9
|
1
|
303
|
SAINZ (ESP)
|
CRUZ (ESP)
|
VOLKSWAGEN
|
33:33:40
|
00:00:00
|
|
2
|
306
|
AL-ATTIYAH (QAT)
|
GOTTSCHALK (DEU)
|
VOLKSWAGEN
|
33:42:06
|
00:08:26
|
|
3
|
305
|
MILLER (USA)
|
PITCHFORD (ZAF)
|
VOLKSWAGEN
|
34:00:57
|
00:27:17
|
|
4
|
301
|
PETERHANSEL (FRA)
|
COTTRET (FRA)
|
BMW
|
35:47:32
|
02:13:52
|
|
5
|
307
|
CHICHERIT (FRA)
|
THOERNER (CHE)
|
BMW
|
36:02:07
|
02:28:27
|
|
6
|
314
|
SOUSA (PRT)
|
BAUMEL (FRA)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
37:18:07
|
03:44:27
|
|
7
|
300
|
DE VILLIERS (ZAF)
|
VON ZITZEWITZ (DEU)
|
VOLKSWAGEN
|
38:10:08
|
04:36:28
|
|
8
|
322
|
SPINELLI (BRA)
|
PALMEIRO (PRT)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
38:49:22
|
05:15:42
|
|
9
|
310
|
NOVITSKIY (RUS)
|
SCHULZ (DEU)
|
BMW
|
39:04:38
|
05:30:58
|
|
10
|
302
|
GORDON (USA)
|
GRIDER (USA)
|
HUMMER
|
39:08:00
|
05:34:20
|
|
11
|
311
|
TERRANOVA (ARG)
|
MAIMON (FRA)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
39:10:29
|
05:36:49
|
|
12
|
332
|
BARBOSA (PRT)
|
RAMALHO (PRT)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
39:38:16
|
06:04:36
|
|
13
|
318
|
MISSLIN (FRA)
|
POLATO (FRA)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
39:51:03
|
06:17:23
|
|
14
|
336
|
LEAL DOS SANTOS (PRT)
|
FIUZA (PRT)
|
BMW
|
40:11:44
|
06:38:04
|
|
15
|
325
|
HENRARD (BEL)
|
BEGUIN (BEL)
|
VOLKSWAGEN
|
40:57:08
|
07:23:28
|
|
16
|
323
|
ERRANDONEA (AND)
|
GARCIN (FRA)
|
SMG
|
43:15:50
|
09:42:10
|
|
17
|
317
|
VAN DEIJNE (NLD)
|
ROSEGAAR (NLD)
|
MITSUBISHI
|
45:28:11
|
11:54:31
|
|
18
|
338
|
GIBON (FRA)
|
MIURA (JPN)
|
TOYOTA
|
46:20:20
|
12:46:40
|
|
19
|
341
|
MITSUHASHI (JPN)
|
CATTARELLI (FRA)
|
TOYOTA
|
47:15:25
|
13:41:45
|
|
|
|
