Sebastien Loeb won the stage 6 of Dakar 2024 and is positioned as Audi’s only great rival to fight for the final Dakar 2024 victory in cars. Carlos Sainz leading the overall standings ahead of his teammate Audi Mattias Ekström with a lead of 20 minutes and 21 seconds. Behind two company cars with four rings is Sebastien Loeb with his Prodrive Hunter, in 29 minutes and 31 seconds. The French driver won stage 6, the dreaded 48-hour time trial that took place in the desert of ‘Empty Quarter’beating Carlos by 2 minutes and one second.
However, the total time difference between the two should be taken from stage 5, because that’s where the two actually started their commitment to stage 6. In that fifth special, Sainz decided to stop before reaching the finish line to completely give up 9 minutes compared to Al-Attiyah. while, Loeb more by admitting that a ‘waypoint‘ to incur a 15-minute penalty, giving a total of 21 minutes and 13 seconds in that fifth special. Both wanted to make sure they started from a delayed position in stage 6 and could continue to attack following the tracks to regain ground, but Loeb stayed away, because between what he recovered in stage 6 and what he lost in stage 5, want , earn less than he achieved Sainz.
In fact, now the distance between the two is 29 minutes, while before the start of stage 5 it was 19 minutes and 21 seconds. That is, between stage 5 and 6, Loeb gave a total of 10 minutes about Carlos in its various approaches.
“It’s not too bad”
“The strategy is right. What makes Audi’s strategy better is that, with a loss of nine minutes, they find themselves far behind and, in addition, Nasser at the front opens up the track very well. So it’s not the right thing. as close as we expected”commented Loeb statements on the official Dakar website after winning stage 6 of Dakar 2024.
“We had to do the stage, we won it and we will move up in the general classification. It’s not that bad, we’re still in the fight”he argued, bringing out the positive side of everything that happened.
“Overall, it was good to do this strategy, but maybe we went too far because what we see is that some gained a little time in other ways, but that’s okay. We are still in the game and that is the main goal, to be 30 minutes from the lead, but we will see, because there is still a long way to go.“, recognized the French driver, seeking his first Dakar victory in cars in his 8th participation in the toughest race in the world, an appointment that for one reason or another always ends up being choked by a lot of bad luck in despite his many stage wins (23 before the 2024 edition).
“In other words, we lost time twice between a tie rod and a triple puncture. Other than that, we’re having a good week”he said, studying the first 6 special stages of a total of 12, in the middle of the rally, before taking a well-deserved rest day this Saturday.
“It’s still very fast. Everything is accelerated to the maximum and the level is very high. At this speed, it’s normal for things to break and things to happen. So far everything is going well for us. We just have to keep going like this and looking for a solution to the holes for the last stages with stones. And that’s it,” he reasoned, believing that everything was still open.
“It’s great to win a tough 48-hour time trial stage after having two great days in the dunes. We knew that 550 km in the empty quarter would be very difficult for the car, so I tried to make it easier in the first part of the stage and not break anything on the first day, but on the second day it was more like sprint, so “I pushed hard to gain some time,” he concluded by summarizing what was his stage 6 as winner of said special.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Rose Herman and I work as an author for Today Times Live. My expertise lies in writing about sports, a passion of mine that has been with me since childhood. As part of my job, I provide comprehensive coverage on everything from football to tennis to golf.
