Pablo Quintanilla won Monday’s attritional eighth motorbike stage in the Dakar Rally as overnight leader Joan Barreda’s title bid evaporated in the spectacular sand dunes on Chile’s Pacific coast.
The grueling 784km timed trek from Bolivia’s salt flats in Uyuni to Iquique in Chile led to a host of high profile contenders for this year’s title limping out, including last year’s runner-up Jordi Viladoms.
While Honda’s Spanish rider Barreda, who led the standings by more than six minutes overnight, is still riding, his chance of glory went up in smoke as he lost almost 1.5 hours.
Photo: AFP
The riders’ classification is now led by last year’s winner, Marc Coma, who was placed second going into Monday’s ride.
The Spanish four-time Dakar winner riding a KTM finished ninth behind Quintanilla to lead overall, more than nine minutes ahead of Paulo Goncalves.
The 38-year-old Spaniard said the stage had been extremely grueling.
Photo: AFP
“It was a very extreme day,” Coma said. “It was too difficult on the salt lake, there was the altitude, the cold — everything mixed in.”
Three other high-profile contenders’ races ended prematurely on Monday: Michael Metge, Alessandro Botturi and Daniel Gouet.
KTM’s Chilean rider Quintanilla was celebrating his first-ever stage win, made all the sweeter as it came on home turf. He moved up a place into third overall, almost 30 minutes behind Coma.
Photo: EPA
He only took the stage by a mere 11 seconds from Juan Pedrero Garcia, with Slovakia’s Stefan Svitko another second away in third.
In fourth came Australian Dakar first-timer Toby Price, only 41 seconds behind the stage winner, and in fifth was Laia Sanz, who is edging closer to being the first woman to win a motorbike stage on the event described as motorsport’s Everest.
“Today was a really hard day, Sanz said. “At the beginning some riders didn’t want to start because it was dangerous and cold, but in the end for me it was a good stage.”
“I’m very happy with this fifth position,” added the 29-year-old, who first competed in the Dakar in 2011.
Monday was a rest day for the car category, which Qatari veteran Nasser al-Attiyah leads.
Yesterday’s ninth stage was a 450km run from Iquique to Calama.
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