Breaking news
Dakar Dakar
Frustrated Peterhansel explains costly Dakar accident
Peugeot's Stephane Peterhansel was left “pissed off” after the accident that took him out of the lead in the 2018 Dakar Rally, the Frenchman admitting he was “probably going too fast”.
Valentin Khorounzhiy
Edited: Jan 14, 2018, 9:22 PM
Copy link
Share on Viber
Peterhansel, a 13-time Dakar champion, had emerged as a runaway leader after an attrition-heavy opening leg of the event in Peru.
He looked set to extend his lead further during Saturday's La Paz – Uyuni stage, but damaged his left-rear suspension and spent over an hour and a half at a standstill.
Peterhansel said this incident was nowhere near as galling as his biggest Dakar heartbreak – the mechanical failure that robbed him of a first car-class win in 2003 – but conceded it was still a major disappointment.
“The worst was when I had not yet won in cars, and I was leading from the first day until the penultimate day and everything went wrong,” he recalled. “The first victory in cars had slipped through my hands and that was hard.
“But here it just pisses me off. It makes me mad for the Peugeot team, for Jean-Paul [Cottret, co-driver], and for myself.
“It won’t change much in the end for my career. I don’t have regrets, we were going fast and I never saw what we hit, I don’t even know if it was a rock, or a piece of wood. We were probably going too fast.”
Peterhansel said the incident had left his Peugeot with damage so extensive that he had to “cannibalise” the 3008DKR Maxi of teammate Cyril Despres, who is playing a support role after he had lost insurmountable amounts of time earlier in the rally.
Recalling the crash, Peterhansel said: “There was a big water puddle and a quad that had stopped, for some reason, so I moved over and then I heard a huge bang, of an incredibly violent nature.
“We tore apart all of the rear assembly: suspension, transmission, shocks, we destroyed everything.
“We started to take things apart and we waited for Cyril and unfortunately he had a few problems in the first few km so he took longer to arrive but then we cannibalised his car.
“We took the two shocks, two suspensions, two brakes. He did an amazing job. We helped him take parts off his car. Ours was ready to receive the parts.”
Peterhansel completed the stage at a competitive pace despite the car being “not 100 percent” and now sits third overall, trailing rally leader and teammate Carlos Sainz by an hour and 20 minutes.
Sainz is the only of Peugeot's four works entries to have had a relatively drama-free Dakar thus far, with Peterhansel's crash adding to Despres' earlier woes and Sebastien Loeb's retirement.
Asked whether Peugeot's problems were down to bad luck, Peterhansel said: “We're creating the bad luck. We're going fast, taking chances, we're not here to go on a Sunday stroll.
“We're here to win races, and when you play that game, sometimes it doesn't go well.
“If we were here to ensure a podium finish, or a top five, there would be fewer problems than what's happening now.”
Additional reporting by Sergio Lillo, translation by Rainier Ehrhardt
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article Injury threatens Barreda's Dakar victory bid
Next article Dakar cancels Monday's Tupiza - Salta stage
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Valentin Khorounzhiy
WTCR's April opener cancelled due to coronavirus
WTCR
WTCR
Hungaroring
WTCR's April opener cancelled due to coronavirus
Australian GP issues update on nine F1 paddock coronavirus tests
Formula 1
Formula 1
Australian GP
Australian GP issues update on nine F1 paddock coronavirus tests
Motorsport Games unveils 15 disciplines for 2020
General
General
Motorsport Games unveils 15 disciplines for 2020
More from
Stéphane Peterhansel
Dakar 2022, Stage 10: Peterhansel wins, Loeb closes on Al-Attiyah
Dakar
Dakar
Dakar
Dakar 2022, Stage 10: Peterhansel wins, Loeb closes on Al-Attiyah
Peterhansel leads Extreme E rookie test line-up for Rosberg
Extreme E
Extreme E
Island X Prix
Peterhansel leads Extreme E rookie test line-up for Rosberg
Peterhansel: Al-Attiyah lost Dakar 2021 due to "ego"
Dakar
Dakar
Dakar
Peterhansel: Al-Attiyah lost Dakar 2021 due to "ego"
More from
Peugeot Sport
Peugeot promotes test driver Alex Quinn to race seat for 2027 WEC
WEC
WEC
Barcelona
Peugeot promotes test driver Alex Quinn to race seat for 2027 WEC
Stoffel Vandoorne to leave Peugeot’s WEC Hypercar team after Fuji
WEC
WEC
Fuji
Stoffel Vandoorne to leave Peugeot’s WEC Hypercar team after Fuji
Why Peugeot is confident its 2027 evo update can address long-standing hypercar issues
WEC
WEC
Fuji
Why Peugeot is confident its 2027 evo update can address long-standing hypercar issues
Latest news
Kyle Busch remembered: Rowdy’s most notable Phoenix moments
NASCAR Cup
NAS NASCAR Cup
Phoenix II
22 min
Kyle Busch remembered: Rowdy’s most notable Phoenix moments
How Geri Halliwell helped Christian Horner deal with fan hate
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1 1 h
How Geri Halliwell helped Christian Horner deal with fan hate
Max Verstappen stars with 15-place charge in 45 minutes: 'I learned a lot and had fun'
GT World Challenge Europe Endurance
WCEE GT World Challenge Europe Endurance
Portimão
2 h
Max Verstappen stars with 15-place charge in 45 minutes: 'I learned a lot and had fun'
Subscribe and access Motorsport.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.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe