Price takes another stage as Dakar Rally enters Bolivia

Stage 5 – Jujuy – Uyuni: Special Stage 327 km, liaison 315
With the 5^th day of race the Dakar circus entered in Bolivia and things started to get tough for the riders and the vehicles stressed by the altitude and the long stages. An extra vigilance was required for this second part of the marathon stage, where the riders needed to preserve their machines, the tyres but also their energies because heading to Bolivia marked an abrupt increase in altitude rising to 4,600m, the higher point in Dakar’s story.

Technically, the rally stepped up a gear in this stage with the first off-piste sections as well as some tricky navigation.

Started 6^th, the KTM factory rider Toby Price, the winner of Stage 2, made the difference since the beginning setting the quickest time at CP2 and at the way point 6, which marked the start of the climb to summit of the Rally, 4,580 m of altitude. The Aussie rode constantly ahead of Joan Barreda and his team mate Antoine Meo and finally won the stage.  It was a great day for KTM, grabbing the first four places. In his first experience of the Dakar, the five-time world enduro champion is showing day after day that he is a very fast learner. Following Meo, Stefan Svitko third at +2’33 and Matthias Walkner fourth at +2’40.

Barreda (Honda) finally finished 5^th, while the leader of the general standing, Paulo Goncalves (Honda) crossed the finish line in 12^th position at +8’56. The Portuguese maintains the lead, but sees his advantage reduced to 1’45 on Svitko and 1’47 on Price, 2’27 on Barreda and 2’57 on Walkner. The first top five riders are close in less than 3 minutes after 5 days of race and 3700 km.

It was a good day also for Laia Sanz in 20^th, the heroine of Stage 4, who stopped 40 minutes to rescue the enduro world champion “Pela” Renet after he crashed 20 kms before the end of the stage and lost consciousness.

In the quad category, the leader of the general standing the Chilean Ignacio Casale (Yamaha) was once again first when the heavy rain made the final part of the stage very complicated.   

“It was a difficult marathon day” said the leader of the general standing Paulo Goncalves, “I have a bit of a headache after two days at high altitude. I’m happy because after the problems of the prologue and the first day, the bike is riding really well. Tomorrow will be another demanding day with more than 500km so it was important to finish today in good shape. On the special, the first hundred and the last hundred kilometres featured a difficult navigation but I could find the right way. I think the second week of race will be harder than this week. Joan (Barreda) was unlucky because he was braking late at the  limit and got penalties, but these things happen. I’m sure he will recover. The race is still long and to have five or six minutes at the moment is nothing”.

“I pushed quiet well and didn’t make any mistakes”, said Meo, the nice surprise of the Dakar 2016, “I was lucky because I don’t have a lot of experience and I could find my way in a day characterized by tricky navigation”.

Tomorrow the competitors will face the longest special section of the Dakar: 542 km in the region of the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia between 3500 and 4200 m in altitude.