Dakar 2017, Stage 5: Santosh continues improvement, TVS Sherco riders shine
Hero MotoSports Rally Team's CS Santosh continued making progress in his recovery road in the truncated Stage 5 of the Dakar Rally, as TVS Sherco's riders have a solid outing on Friday's running.
Photo by: Hero MotoSports Team Rally
The fifth stage of the cross-country rally was shortened due to poor weather, with riders only having to complete 219km of the planned 447km, running from Tupiza to Oruro in Bolivia.
It was a day of advancement for all the remaining four riders of the two Indian manufacturers in the 2017 edition of the Dakar Rally.
Hero's Santosh finished 61st in the stage and was 70th overall with a total time of 21hr23m57s, just over six hours behind another new leader Sam Sunderland in the KTM.
Apart from the second and fourth way points, the Indian improved on his time, as his teammate Joaqium Rodrigues continued his steady run ending up 11th in both the standings.
The Portuguese rider started the day slowly on his Speedbrain 450 bike, but eventually caught up to finish 1hr10m20s behind Sunderland.
Meanwhile, TVS Sherco riders made massive improvements with Joan Pedrero finishing fourth quickest in the stage, a mere 9m40s on Stage 5 winner Sunderland.
In the process, the experienced Spanish rider made up seven places on his RTR 450 bike from his Stage 4 position to sit 24th overall, at the end of the fifth day's running.
Teammate Adrien Metge also had a fruitful day ending up 12th behind Rodrigues, in Stage 5. The Frenchman, thus, improving to 45th in the general rankings, just 0.06s behind KTM's Lyndon Poskitt.
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