Carlos Sainz flew at the premiere of the new Audi and Loeb suffered before the W2RC

Last year, Carlos Sainz accepted one of the most ambitious challenges of his sports career. “One of the hardest,” he told MD. He had to lead the development of a pioneering Audi RS Q e-Tron for its technology and its electric motorization. In Dakar, the Spaniard and his teammate showed a lot of speed through the winning stages, but they arrived without having tested the car in a previous race, so setbacks appeared in Dakar, and with 200 kilograms more than the minimum established. by regulation. This year, the second generation of this car, the RS Q e-Tron E2, was born with 80 kilograms less and has the chance to prove itself in a race at the Morocco Rally. Y The premiere could not have been better, with Carlos setting the best time in the first stage of the Moroccan event.

It is true that the comparisons cannot be exact with its direct rivals for the Dakar because Audi competes outside the list of entries participating for Rally victory and in the FIM World Rally Raid, with the sole purpose of conducting a real test with his car after 9 days of previous tests in Morocco, three for each of his drivers. However, it is noteworthy that in his first performance in 2023, the Spaniard was the fastest on a problem-free day.

“Good stage, no problems or holes. First position. Good debut for the Audi RS Q e-Tron E2. Let’s keep adding kilometers!”, Carlos Sainz said after the first day of racing.

Carlos staged so well that he left his colleagues for more than 10 minutes: Ekström finished in 10’22” and Peterhansel finished in 11’37”.

Al-Attiyah, all out for the W2RC title

Nasser Al-Attiyah arrives at the Morocco Rally one point below the leader of the new FIA World Rally-Raid (W2RC), sebastien loeband after winning the prologue stage with his Toyota Hilux, he showed his great speed, although two holes in the last part kept him away from the final victory, which went to the Toyota of Al Rajhithat brought him out Al-Attiyah 3’13” on the reigning Dakar champion. Al-Rajhi took the lead in the race and would start to open the track with an advantage of 3’05” overall.

The worst part was taken by Sébastien Loeb (BRX), when he destroyed his car’s suspension at the start of the special, losing 20 minutes at the first checkpoint. Finally, he showed a great pace, as he reached the finish line just under 19 minutes behind the best.

The positive side for BRX thinking about the Dakar was the good pace shown by Loeb and also by rookie Guerlain Chicherit, who finished fourth, 10 minutes behind Al-Rajhi after staying a minute behind best until the last two checkpoints. Przygonski (X-Raid Mini JCW) was third, 7’29” behind the winner.

For his part, with Isidre Esteve’s debut at the wheel of a Hilux T1+, the Catalan finished the first stage in 11th position, 29’14” behind the best.

The branch wins in motorcycles

on motorcycles, Ross branch (Hero) prevailed with an advantage of 1’09 in relation to Luciano Benavidez (Husqvarna) thanks to its good starting position. Toby Price (KTM) finished third at 2’31” and hello (Husqvarna) in fourth place at 3’20”. Sunderlandthe FIM Rally-Raid World Championship leader finished fifth in 4’33”. Tosha Schareina finished in eleventh position in 13’44”, while lorenzo santolino He finished 12th despite a lot of dust throughout the day.

Lawrenceafter making a mistake at a crossroads in the prologue on Saturday, which killed him a penalty where he had to start from the bottom of the standings, survived the dust and made more than 20 passes. He had up to 43 riders ahead and the man from Salamanca saved a difficult ballot to finish with a very good score in 12th position.