Important last-minute change in Dakar: Another Marathon!

The Dakar organization, after changing its plans at the last minute on Thursday, is taking its bivouac directly to Riyadh without passing Al Duwadimi and restructuring the route of the race, he again gave a statement to the press present in the camp where he announced another change, in this case, that could add a lot of spice to Dakar in all its categories. Change is very important and can change everything. Tomorrow’s stage and the second stage (stage 7 and 8) will be in marathon formatalbeit with a small change: the pilots will have some help from their teams, but in this case it will only take a maximum of 2 hours (Normally, in a marathon they do not have the mechanical assistance of their teams when they arrive at the bivouac).

Good news for Sainz

Instead of canceling stage 7 due to rains, the organization decided to reduce that special, but make it more strict at the same time by adding a new standard for that day of a maximum of two hours of help, something it can do. put the cars that suffer accidents at that stage in a lot of trouble. Pilots have to be very careful not to damage their cars, and others may attack in search of cutting time, even taking great risks. That’s what Carlos Sainz can do, more than half an hour behind Al-Attiyah in the general. Stage 7 will be a great opportunity to attack and put pressure on Nasser looking for some mistakes from the Qatari that could change the race.

However, it should be noted that the big teams have trucks registered in the race with mechanics and parts, so these mechanics, who appear as competitors, can repair cars if necessary. Of course, with fewer troops than usual and no direct face-to-face contact with engineers to compare telemetry and conduct other types of studies.

Later, there will be another Marathon, this time without help

In the first route, it is only planned to have a marathon stage, which is divided into two parts: stage 11 and stage 12. At the end of stage 11 the drivers will not have the help of their teams, they will have to fix their cars with their hands or the help of other competitors and they will have to sleep in a tent. Now, in this difficult challenge, a new marathon stage has been added (stages 7 and 8)with route changes also detailed below releases:

As weather forecasts prevented the use of Al Duwadimi bivouac as a base for the entire caravan, stages 7 and 8 were changed to marathon mode to offer competitors an equivalent and relevant sports program. Starting from the initial route, the special stages 7 and 8 are exchanged, shortening their distance for better management of the contact mileage each day.

. For stage 7, which will take place on Saturday, January 7 (Riyadh > Al Duwadimi), the special will have 333 kilometers. Since the drivers have not planned a real marathon stage at this point in the race, a service zone will be organized after the arrival of the special (link, 94 km), with a maximum intervention time of two hours. Next, the crew will go to Al Duwadimi (240 km link), where their cars will be parked in the parc fermé.

. Stage 8, on Sunday, January 8, will head to Riyadh and include the loop originally planned for stage 7, minus 128 kilometers. So, the time trial will run for 345 kilometers, after which the participants will go to the Riyadh bivouac.

. The rest day will be in Riyadh on January 9, and then the Dakar will continue according to the original schedule… under the sun!

This is the change:

Previous idea:

6/1, STAGE 6: HA’IL > AL DUWADIMI 877.69km | 467km

7/1, STAGE 7: AL DUWADIMI > AL DUWADIMI 641.46 km | 472km

8/1, STAGE 8: AL DUWADIMI > RIYADH 713.85 km | 398km

New plan:

6/1, STAGE 6: HA’IL > AL DUWADIMI (-110 km from schedule and connection to Riyadh)

7/1, STAGE 7: RIYADH > AL DUWADIMI: 333 kilometers. (unplanned)

8/1, STAGE 8: AL DUWADIMI > RIYADH (345 kilometers) This is the old loop planned as stage 7 with a start and finish in Al Dawadimi. But in this case, 128 kilometers are subtracted from the planned and the pilots will make a connection to Riyadh.