Robby Gordon's Dakar hopes virtually over as Stephane Peterhansel increases lead
Robby Gordon's slim hopes of winning the Dakar Rally took another nosedive on Thursday as Stephane Peterhansel increased his lead by winning stage 11
Having lost over 17 minutes to Peterhansel and dropped to third the previous day, Gordon set a hot pace as the rally left the Chilean town of Arica and headed towards Arequipa in Peru.
The Hummer driver had pulled back nearly three minutes on Peterhansel's X-raid Mini by the third of eight checkpoints on the 297-mile stage. But he slowed dramatically shortly afterwards, falling six minutes behind Peterhansel over the next 60 miles due to a broken CV joint boot. He then stopped for over an hour to change the part on the link road between the two parts of the stage.
Gordon, already competing under appeal after event organisers disqualified him on Tuesday for running an illegal tyre re-inflation system, was 1h11m off the pace as a result and fell from third place to fourth.
Peterhansel's stage win came by 3m44s from his X-raid team-mate Nani Roma and increased his overall advantage over the Spaniard to 22m49s with only two stages remaining.
Former Dakar winner Giniel de Villiers was fourth quickest through the stage and is now a comfortable third overall; the Toyota driver 1h11m behind Peterhansel and a likely 20 minutes clear of Gordon.
Leonid Novitskiy retained his fifth place with the fifth fastest time, while Krzysztof Holowczyc recovered from his Wednesday maladies with sixth fastest.
There was bad news for Carlos Sousa, who began the day sixth. His Great Wall stopped in the dunes inside the first 100 miles of the stage. Despite losing almost an hour, he only lost one place.
Leading positions after stage 11: Pos Driver Car Time/Gap 1. Stephane Peterhansel Mini 32h38m05s 2. Nani Roma Mini + 22m49s 3. Giniel de Villiers Toyota + 1h11m01s 4. Robby Gordon Hummer + 2h10m31s 5. Leonid Novitskiy Mini + 2h11m10s 6. Lucio Alvarez Toyota + 3h53m51s 7. Carlos Sousa Great Wall + 4h04m43s 8. Bernard ten Brinke Mitsubishi + 4h17m36s 9. Ricardo Leal dos Santos Mini + 4h38m11s 10. Duncan Vos Toyota + 4h50m21s
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments