I'll skip the prologue since it's not worth discussing at all imo
Toby Price takes power in the bike classification after being 17th in the prologue. the defending champion beats Goncalves and de Soultrait by around 4 minutes. the classification is the same except that Sam Sunderland is 3rd overall due to a time penalty De Soultrait delibratly got after winning the prologue.
the three way constructed battle from Peugeot (leader: Peterhansel/Loeb/Sainz), Toyota (Al-Attiyah/Roma) and Mini (Al Rajhi/Hirvonen) in the car classification the first strike is for Peugeot as Loeb wins and leads after stage 2. Al Attiyah, who got a luky escape after the prologue due to an engine fire that was quickly put out. had this happend on day 2 it would have been game over already for the Qatari. Sainz is 3rd. De Villiers (Toyota), Roma, Al Rajhi, Peterhansel, Hirvonen and Dumas complete the top 10.
A year ago I shared an image of a truck that has complety burned down. Van den Brink was forced to watch while a year of work just burned down. fast forward a year later to now and he wins his first Dakar stage ever. in the Kamaz vs Iveco/MAN battle Sotnikov (2nd) now leads Versluis (3rd/MAN) by just not a minute. defending champion De Rooy is in 5th a minute behind Sotnikov. Mardeev and Nikolaev lose some big time with Mardeev losing 16 minutes! and Nikolaev 4 minutes on van den Brink
the race leaders of yesterday (stage 2) wouldn't lead stage 3 in the main classifications (sorry quad and UTV I'm not sure)
Al-Attiyah did not want to start stage 3 as first which is partly why Loeb won stage 2, it showed immediatly why because Loeb got lost very soon. Loeb at least managed to save 3rd place behind Peugeot teammates Peterhansel and Sainz. Hirvonen shows himself in the Dakar for the first time and while the stages get to the type what you would expect of Dakar. you might wonder where Toyota went, well that's an candidate for blunder of the Dakar. Roma ran out of fuel and lost 13 minutes, De Villiers ran out of fuel and lost 36 minutes, Al-Attiyah crashed and lost 2 hours 17, Van Loon ran out of fuel and lost 3 hours 36.
Top 3 and team leaders (Peugeot/Mini and Toyota)
Stage
Overall
#1 Peterhansel (Peugeot) 4h18'17"
#1 Loeb (Peugeot) 6h54'56"
#2 Sainz (Peugeot) +1'54"
#2 Sainz (Peugeot) +0'42"
#3 Loeb (Peugeot) +3'08"
#3 Peterhansel (Peugeot) +4'18"
#4 Hirvonen (Mini) +3'57"
#4 Hirvonen (Mini) +9'38"
#8 Roma (Toyota) +13'16"
#5 Roma (Toyota) +13'04"
Juan Barreda Bort abslutely destroyed the competition whilst also taking the lead. Price took a heavy hit while he got lost together with Matthias Walkner. Helder Rodrigues however took another heavy hit as he lost another 45 minutes, he hasn't shown why he's a multiple top 10 finisher overall. many riders had trouble with altitude sickness including Goncalves, he managed to limit his losses to Barreda somewhat as he finished 5th.
also worth mentioning are Slovakian Ivan Jakes was actually struck by lightning during the stage but managed to finish 16th. he is cleared to start, thanks to his bike acting as a conductor towards the ground. not so luky was Senn van Basel because his bike actually exploded. aftermatch vid shot by Senn van Basel https://www.faceb...990127503/
Stage
Overall
#1 Barreda Bort (Honda) 4h23'41"
#1 Barreda Bort (Honda) 7h36'30"
#2 Sunderland (KTM) +12'29"
#2 Sunderland (KTM) +10'20"
#3 Renet (Husqvarna) +15'30"
#3 Goncalves (Honda) +13'42"
#9 Price (KTM) +21'51"
#5 Toby Price (KTM) +16'19"
I'm sorry about this short overview but my television source was broadcast while no trucks had finished at the time.
van den Brink has standed for unknown reasons and did not finish but is also not listed as retirement. not sure what is the situation. De Rooy had problems with tire-inlfation system (changing tyre pressure from the cockpit I believe) he had three flat that couldn't be pumped up again, whilst only have two spares. he and his crew resulted to manually inflating the tyre again every so often a total of six times. in the Kamaz camp there were no problems and Nikolaev took victory, with outsider Kolomy in the Tatra made a surprise 2nd
okay I missed a bit so I'll keep it short until I'm back up to yesterday's stage
=Bikes=
Stage 4: Price had a big crash and broke a leg. Sunderland loses 16 min, Walkner wins the stage while Barreda Bort loses 2 min on him.
Stage 5: Van Beveren was the moral winner of the stage, finished 3rd and is the best Yamaha at the time, Goncalves finished 2nd after losing a huge load of time yesterday. Sunderland won in his first 5th stage ever, after retiring before that on two earlier occasions
Stage 6: Cancelled due to heavy rain
=Cars=
Stage 4: Al-Attiyah had to retire due to damages after his crash. Peugeot has problems today: Loeb loses 22 min due to turbo issues; Peterhansel got lost and got stuck, loses 15 min; Sainz crashed and had to retire. the 4th Peugeot rider won however in Cyril Despres before Hirvonen and Roma.
Stage 5: Hirvonen makes a nagivation mistake and loses 45 minutes, Despres already lost his overall lead which is now taken by Peterhansel. stage is won by Loeb
Stage 6: Cancelled due to heavy rain
=Trucks=
Stage 4: Mardeev leads the whole stage but De Rooy wins the stage in the last few km. wins an hour on Kolomy, 23 min on Nikolaev. Sotnikov now leads Villagra and Nikolaev, De Rooy now 5th, Mardeev 6th.
Stage 5: Sotnikov loses the lead, Mardeev finished 3rd loses 14 min on De Rooy who wins the stage, Nikolaev loses 11 min on De Rooy who takes the lead. partly thanks to his navigator.
Stage 6: Cancelled due to heavy rain
=stage 7=
first part of the marathon stage (no techincal assistance at overnight stay), someone we haven't seen that much off so far is Laya Sanz, finished 23st today and is 25th overall. Van Beveren loses a lot of time on Sam Sunderland who is the leader, he's still 3rd overall though. Barreda who had trouble somewhere I couldn't find as he's now an hour behind, did finish 4th today. Sunderland eventually finished 3rd. 1-2 was for Honda with Goncalves finishing 2nd and surprise winner Brabac, first american bike-stage winner since 2012
#1 Brabac (Honda) 2h02'05"
#1 Sunderland 17h28'53"
#2 Goncalves (Honda) +1'44"
#2 Quintanilla +17'45"
#3 Sunderland (KTM) +4'43"
#3 Van Beveren +22'16"
#8 Quintanilla (Husqvarna) +10'28"
#8 Goncalves +1h05'22"
#9 Van Beveren (Yamaha) + 10'52"
#13 Brabec 1h44'44"
Week 2 has started, first part of the stage was cut due to heavy rain. Hirvonen (Mini) and Roma (Toyota) admitted that due to the height, Peugeot are unbeatable so they have to limit the damages. Since it's a marathon stage there are two option, going safe to limit damage or go full on risking damage. Hirvonen did the latter and hit something tearing his right front open, since it was like 8 km before the finish they decided to not switch it. Despres messing up navigation and takes it safe so he loses 3rd place to Roma. Roma loses some time but is only 11 min behind Peterhansel. Loeb loses 48 sec on him thanks to trouble in the mud. However we have entered the part of the race where Loeb meet real Dakar and got stuck in sand and lost hours. Peterhansel wins the stage but the top 4 is amazingly close together in comparisment.
#1 Peterhansel (Peugeot) 1h54'08"
#1 Peterhansel 15h57'06"
#2 Loeb (Peugeot) +48"
#2 Loeb +1'57
#3 De Villiers (Toyota) +3'33"
#3 Roma +11'07"
#4 Hirvonen (Mini) +5'03"
#4 Despres +14'01"
#5 Roma (Toyota) +5'32"
#5 Hirvonen +47'24"
#7 Despres (Peugeot) +9'07"
#6 De Villiers +1h11'44"
the Kamaz took charge with Sotnikov winning the stage while De Rooy only finishes 4th. The Dutchman has only a two minute lead on the Russian while Nikolaev/Mardeev despite losing time are still 3-4. honestly counting out Mardeev is even an unwise decision because Kamaz are known for taking many risks for the overall win. (they started late so my broadcast didn't have much information)
Barreda Bort was the fastest at WP1 and didn't give up the lead the whole race, Sunderland gained time on both Quintanilla (3'13" and Van Beveren (6'31" by finishing 3rd. it looks like it's decided for the overall save from trouble for Sunderland. Walkner finished 2nd.
#1 Barreda Bort (Honda) 4h28'21"
#1 Sunderland 22h01'08"
#2 Walkner (KTM) +3'51"
#2 Quintanilla +20'58"
#3 Sunderland (KTM) +3'54"
#3 Van Beveren +28'49"
#7 Quintanilla (Husqvarna) +7'07"
#4 Walkner +34'14"
#11 Van Beveren (Yamaha) +10'27"
#9 Barreda Bort +1h10'53"
2nd part of the marathon stage and it comes with news that there won't be any teamorders from Peugeot which looks to make a exiting finale between Loeb/Peterhansel/Despres. today was the day that the people who should attack failed and lost a lot of time, Roma lost 14 minutes and Hirvonen lost 8 minutes. Peugeot has now dropped them and make it a 1-2-3 again. the order however also changed as Loeb now takes the lead. The combination of Sebastien Loeb and Daniel Elena continue to proves the strongest with Elena beating Cottret and Castera in their navigating duties.
#1 Loeb (Peugeot) 4h11'02"
#1 Loeb 20h10'05"
#2 Peterhansel (Peugeot) +3'35"
#2 Peterhansel +1'38"
#3 Despres (Peugeot) +5'13"
#3 Despres +17'17"
#4 Hirvonen (Mini) +8'14"
#4 Roma +23'26"
#7 Roma (Toyota) +14'26"
#5 Hirvonen +53'41"
Kamaz takes the lead as De Rooy only finished 9th thanks to a flat tyre 3/4 into the special stage. He limites the damage to the leader as 2'20" is the gap towards the Kamaz rider Sotnikov, who finishes 4th behind Nikolaev who also overtakes De Rooy. Local hero Villagra had to settle with 2nd as it was van den Brinck who wins the stage by only being 17 seconds faster. the overall still looks close and anyone can win of Sotnikov, Nikolaev and De Rooy. we did loss Mardeev as an overall contestant he lost 2 hours today. special mention to Viazovich and Vasilevski for unexpected top 10 finishes.
#1 Van den Brink (Renault) 1h55'20"
#1 Sotnikov 17h52'20"
#2 Villagra (Iveco) +17s
#2 Nikolaev +1'46"
#3 Nikolaev (Kamaz) +42s
#3 De Rooy +2'20"
#4 Sotnikov (Kamaz) +2'42"
#4 Villagra +29'06"
#7 Versluis (MAN) +6'09"
#6 Versluis +57'06"
#9 De Rooy (Iveco) +7'13"
#38 Van den Brink +23h58'53"
Stage 9 was cancelled due to various circumstances all related to the extreme weather
PCM.Daily NFL Fantasy Football Champion: 2012 PCM.Daily NHL Prediction Game Champion: 2013 PCM.Daily NFL Prediction Game Champion: 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2021
AMA Supercross, sponsored by Monster Energy, is the American equivalent to FIM Motocross that is mainly European based, the main difference being that it is held Indoors in arenas instead of outdoors on purpose made tracks.
FIM Motocross and the MX des Nations (3 man international team event, one rider on each class of bike) should probably get added to your list also.
the trick to the stage was the first part of the stage where the riders got a maze to navigate through. Barreda, Sunderland, Walkner, Quintanilla all lost time there. Quintanilla had trouble as he's was pretty was fast before the neutralisation but crashed in the 2nd part of the stage and had to retire with a concussion. The maze made sure we got some unexpected names in the top 10 with Caimi in the top 3, Helder Rodrigues 5th (he was invisible all rally) Cervantes 6th, Adrian Metge 7th, Klymciw 9th. Barreda finished 2nd behind his Honda Metge, however Metge got a hour time penalty for missing a waypoint. Svitko gets elevated to 2nd
#1 Barreda Bort (Honda) 5h49'45"
#1 Sunderland 28h07'59"
#2 Svitko (KTM) +24s
#2 Walkner +30'01"
#3 Caimi (Honda) +3'48"
#3 Farres Guell +38'43"
#10 Walkner (KTM) +12'53"
#5 Barreda Bort +53'47"
#12 Sunderland (KTM) +17'06"
#9 Caimi +1h37'57"
#13 Farres Guell (KTM) +21'25"
#10 Svitko +1h48'45"
yesterday was the day where the peugeot chases lost connection to the peugeot, today they threw away any hopes they had to beat them. Hirvonen made a big mistake by following a dried up river, only to find out the route was wrong and while turning around he got stuck, he lost almost 4 hours by getting stuck. Roma lost more than a half hour but that puts and end to any hopes he had. it's a battle with Daniel Elana (Loeb's navigator) and Jean Paul Cottret (Peterhansel's navigator). Peterhansel however hit Simon Marcic (bike rider, broke his leg on two places) and waited for the assistance helicopter to arrive. He finished 6'54" behind Loeb but was given time back for sportive behavior. 14 minutes and 22 seconds in total meaning that Peterhansel wins the stage and retakes the overall lead from Loeb. Loeb nearly hit a quad rider head on in the maze when they came from the opposite route
#1 Peterhansel (Peugeot) 4h47'00"
#1 Peterhansel 24h58'53"
#2 Loeb (Peugeot) +7'28"
#2 Loeb +5'50"
#3 Despres (Peugeot) +10'01"
#3 Despres +25'40"
#10 Roma (Toyota) +38'57"
#4 Roma +1h00'55"
#37 Hirvonen (Mini) +4h44'30"
#15 Hirvonen +5h36'33"
Kamaz 1-2-3 with Nikolaev taking the double by passing Sotnikov. Mardeev rounds out the podium with De Rooy losing a lot of time thanks to a two flat tyres, a missing waypoint and a fractured rib. Viazovich finishes 4th with his MAZ. Stacey however quit the race because he used a joker which allows a member of top 10 overall to start 11th when they had trouble the day before (he was scheduled to start 99th and since he's one of the fastest trucks in the rally it was even dangerous), he gets a timecard to leave as 12th (Mardeev also used this) but was denied to start by the ASO to start as 12th while his time does start running. He then went to the next bivak effectively retiring from the race.
sammyt93 wrote:
AMA Supercross, sponsored by Monster Energy, is the American equivalent to FIM Motocross that is mainly European based, the main difference being that it is held Indoors in arenas instead of outdoors on purpose made tracks.
FIM Motocross and the MX des Nations (3 man international team event, one rider on each class of bike) should probably get added to your list also.
Exactly this I just started watching a few years ago but still prefer NASCAR and #8 this year for JJ
PCM.Daily NFL Fantasy Football Champion: 2012 PCM.Daily NHL Prediction Game Champion: 2013 PCM.Daily NFL Prediction Game Champion: 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2021
Kurt Busch won the Daytona 500. Tony Stewart goes to victory lane for the first time in the race but as an owner not a driver.
Tons of wrecks and the new "segment" system made for some exciting racing towards the end of each segment. The drivers just waited too long to make a move. Chase Elliott & Martin Truex Jr. both looked like they could win but ran out of gas.
Always interesting to see the Top 5 of these races. 4 out of these 5 won't see the top 10 for a very long time
PCM.Daily NFL Fantasy Football Champion: 2012 PCM.Daily NHL Prediction Game Champion: 2013 PCM.Daily NFL Prediction Game Champion: 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2021
Kurt got the strategy just right and drove it hard as others faltered. Chase lead it for too long and used up the fuel. My man Kyle Larsson made the move to kick off the final laps and i believe he had the speed to edge Kurt but alas like so many fuel ran dry just short. Watching Logano and Blaney at the back of the line was good, kept trying to make it work and then suddenly Ryan shot forwards and that would have been an incredible steal at the death. But Kurt and his Stewart-Haas team did the business, thouroughly deserved.
Segments didn't excite me. Caused a lap of action but didn't excite it for me in any meaningful way, and i don't think it will do so until later in the year and people are fighting for a chase spot. They would be more interesting if it didn't end with a Caution and we kept racing.
Quite a nice 500. Bit of intrigue early on seeing how the segments would work. Lots of hard driving once they were out the way. And a tense finish. Looks like a nice open field this year, and i hope makes for a good close season.