CHILECITO: Carlos Sainz has his second Dakar rally title in his sights after the Spaniard stretched his lead to more than an hour on Wednesday after organisers rescinded a 10-minute penalty imposed earlier in the week for an incident with a quadbike.

The double world rally champion, and father of the Formula One driver of the same name, finished third for Peugeot in the 281km, 11th stage from Belen to the sand dunes of Fiambala and Chilecito in Argentina.

That left Sainz an hour and 45 seconds clear of French team mate and 13-times champion Stephane Peterhansel, who finished fourth in the stage won by Toyota’s Dutch driver Bernhard ten Brinke, with three days to go.

“This is one of the Dakar classics. I lost the Dakar here in 2009 when I started with a 30-minute lead and I ended up in a hole, so it’s very good to have got through it,” said Sainz. “We have to continue like this, day after day, and what was important was not to lose Stephane.”

Ten Brinke dominated the stage, finishing more than four minutes ahead of Peugeot drivers Cyril Despres, Sainz and Peterhansel as the Dutchman timing 4 hours, 10 minutes, 54 seconds. Despres of France was 4:35 behind in second place, with Sainz 4:40 behind.

Sainz had lost 13 minutes to Peterhansel on Tuesday’s 10th stage but after containing his closest rival on Wednesday made a crucial step towards taking the 2018 title, with a move away from the dunes and to more manageable routes.

In the overall classification, Qatar’s two-time Dakar winner Nasser al-Attiyah was in third place for Toyota, an hour and 24 minutes off the leader’s pace.

Sainz had started the day 50 minutes clear but, despite the top four finishing within 15 seconds of each other, gained another 10 minutes thanks to the stewards.

“Carlos now has a comfortable lead and Stephane is covering him in second place. But there’s still a long way to go to the finish and we have to get to Cordoba with no drama, which is never a given,” said Peugeot Sport head Bruno Famin.

Dutch rider Kees Koolen had claimed on Monday that Sainz had hit his machine on a previous stage and failed to stop, with the stewards penalising the Spaniard.

Sainz had angrily denied any contact was made and Peugeot had backed him up.

“We appreciate the event stewards looking into this again and re-examining all the documents and other evidence at their disposal,” Famin said in a Peugeot statement.

“We supplied them with a certain amount of data, relating to the speed and movement of the car. They were able to compare that to the tracking and ascertain that Carloss point of view was the correct one - of which we never had any doubt.”

Matthias Walkner is also close to the motorcycle title despite finishing fifth on Wednesday, nearly 10 minutes behind his nearest challenger Kevin Benavides.

KTM rider Walkner is 32 minutes ahead of Honda’s Argentine rider Benavides, and after seeing former leader Adrien Van Beveren crash out on Tuesday witnessed Honda’s Joan Barreda retire in the special stage, finally giving into the knee pain that he had complained of since Saturday.

Barreda had won three stages and was second in the general classification going into Wednesday’s 11th stage, won in 4hr 01min 33sec by Australian Toby Price who climbed to third overall.

Published in Dawn, January 19th, 2018