Al Attiyah in cars and Honda in motorcycles remain in charge in Abu Dhabi

The second stage of Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge which is 250 kilometers in the middle of the Liwa desert where almost 50% is sand. For motorcycles, it was the first day of the Marathon stage and victory went to Husqvarna Luciano Benavides while Honda’s Adrien Van Beveren led the general classification ahead of his teammate Pablo Quintanilla and the youngest of Benavides.

in cars, Nasser Al-Attiyah He was able to manage his advantage and prevail ahead of his teammate Yazeed Al Rajhi and the Ford of Martin Prokop. The Toyota Gazoo Racing driver increased his lead in the ADDC overall standings over the Saudi driver.

Van Beveren new motorcycle leader

The Hondas of Quintanilla and Van Beveren started the opening stage of the route and finished the day 9th and 5th, but maintained their lead in the general classification. The Frenchman snatched the ADDC lead from the Chilean by 1’30”. Stage winner Luciano Benavides put his Husqvarna on the third step of the overall podium, 3’27” behind VBA. Second of the day in 1’17”, Nacho Cornejo is in 4th overall just 1 second behind the Argentine, so he is very close to the 100% HRC podium. Toby Price (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing), 8th today, he goes from 3rd to 6th place overall, nearly 4 minutes behind the leader Overall differences remain small: Skyler Howes, 8th, is less than 6 minutes behind.

In the Rally2 category, Paolo Lucci (BAS World KTM Racing) won with 8’23” ahead of rookie Tobias Ebster (SRG Motorsports). He also led Jean-Loup Lepan (Duust Diverse Racing), Toni Mulec (BAS World KTM Racing) and Konrad Dabrowski (Duust Diverse Racing). In the overall W2RC standings, the Italian is more than 14 minutes ahead of Konrad and almost 15 minutes from Jean-Loup.

In the quad category, Laisvydas Kancius ended Abdulaziz Ahli’s winning streak by winning the final stage in less than 2 minutes. The Emirati continues to lead the race with more than 42 minutes ahead of the Lithuanian and almost an hour ahead of Rodolfo Guillioli. In accordance with the rules of the Marathon stage format, drivers in the RallyGP category have half an hour (one hour for those in the Rally2 category) to carry out mechanical maintenance, without outside help, upon arrival at the bivouac.

Al Attiyah, with an iron hand on cars

Nasser Al Attiyah (Toyota Gazoo Racing) on ​​Monday watched his biggest rival in the world championship, Sébastien Loeb (Bahrain Raid Xtreme), lose his hopes of winning the ADDC by failing to finish the stage. Some wonder if the Qatari will manage his career as he did in the second week of the Dakar, leaving the Frenchman to win a record six in a row and score as many W2RC points. The answer is clear: Al Attiyah crushed the competition

At the end of the stage, his victory was first announced with an advantage of 7’47” over Loeb and 12’14” over Al Rajhi. But then the BRX driver received a 15′ penalty for missing a stage timing point, plus 50 hours for changing his engine overnight following his breakdown the previous day, as required by the regulations and expected of the Prodrive team. . Nasser Al Attiyah now leads with 18’19” advantage over Al Rajhi.

In T3, Mattias Ekstrom, who ran out of fuel yesterday, won today and placed fifth in the stage standings, 18’30” behind Al Attiyah. He led the three members of the Red Bull Off-Road Junior Team USA, Seth Quintero (+ 2’41’ ‘) , Austin Jones (+4’34”) and Mitch Guthrie (4’34”). Overall, Quintero leads Jones by 9’41”. Aliyyah Koloc (Buggyra ZM Racing) is third in general of W2RC .

In T4, Rokas Baciuska (Red Bull Can-Am Factory) won the stage ahead of Pau Navarro (FN Speed). The Lithuanian has an advantage of more than 9 minutes over the Catalan total.