Dakar
Dakar: Gauloises Racing stage four report
In the bikes, Spaniard Nani Roma win the special in convincing fashion, 0'16 ahead of De Azevedo and Richard Sainct at 0'18. Overall Richard Sainct holds on to the overall lead ahead of team mate Cyril Despres with Nani Roma third on the V-twin.
Published: Jan 8, 2003, 10:14 PM
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In the bikes, Spaniard Nani Roma win the special in convincing fashion, 0'16 ahead of De Azevedo and Richard Sainct at 0'18.
Overall Richard Sainct holds on to the overall lead ahead of team mate Cyril Despres with Nani Roma third on the V-twin. In the cars victory went once again to Peterhansel with De Mevius second at 0'22 and Vatanen third equal with Jean Louis Schlesser at 0'28. Overall Peterhansel extends his lead over De Villiers with Masuoka third. Jean Louis is now in 10th place at 3'55 with Josep Maria 12th at 4'25. In the trucks De Rooy senior again won the day, beating Tchaguine and Kabirov while overall the De Rooy family preserve first and second places with 'Junior' 2'05 behind Dad.
Ren? Metge and ?lodie Metge.
Photo by Gauloises Racing.
Motorcycles:
Richard Sainct (Gauloises KTM) 3rd at 0'18
"To lose one minute over such a short distance seems a lot to me when they released the fist classification! Apart from that everything is fine. Third isn't a bad starting position for tomorrow -- first would have been fine too..."
Cyril Despres (Gauloises KTM) 4th at 0'22
"Nice to be back in Africa. It is always a pleasure to have the sun and scenery. As much as you could I tried to calculate my starting position for tomorrow and fourth suits me fine. You never know, having Fabrizio behind me might work out well."
Fabrizio Meoni (Gauloises KTM) 5th at 0'38
"I'm very happy to be putting up my tent for the first time. As far as today's time is concerned, to be honest I'm not that bothered. For me the race starts tomorrow and looking at the profile of the special I don't think where you start will make much difference as the going should be mainly over hard piste."
Alfie Cox (Gauloises KTM) 12h at 1'18
"The special was fast and very slippery but too short -- it was over almost before it had started. I didn't attack too hard as I didn't want to start first tomorrow but I didn't expected to finish so far down -- ideally I would have liked to have started just behind the front runners. Still it might work out to my advantage. Normally there should be some sand and some navigation and that should allow me to close up on the leaders."
Giovani Sala (Gauloises KTM) 17th at 1'35
"Not a special for the V-twin -- I was spinning the rear wheel a lot and lost some time. At this stage though I don't think it is that important."
Eric Verhoef (KTM) 9th at 1'08
"I'm very happy with my result. I'm not used to 'semi-opening' the piste and missed a couple of corners. Plus it was very slippery -- a little bit holiday on ice. Tomorrow it will be good to start in 9th. The front runners won't be able to go too fast through the dunes and I should be able to catch them up and get a good finishing position."
Miran Stanovnik (KTM) 81st
"I lost a little time today. I missed a corner, tried to take a short cut back on to the piste and got stuck in the mud! Apart from that everything is going fine."
Cars:
Jean-Louis Schlesser (Gauloises Schlesser Ford) 4th at 0'28
"It is good to be in Africa! The special still wasn't especially suited to us, very slippery and twisty but better than they have been up until now. Tomorrow we will be starting in 4th place which given the profile of the stage is about ideal. I'm looking forward to having a good day."
Josep Maria Servia (Gauloises Schlesser Ford) 12th at 1'37
No probelm with the car, but we took it easy. Depending on how the special looks tomorrow we might attack a little bit harder."
-gr-
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