Dakar 2012 – Stage 11 – I Watch Too Much Racing

Stage 11

Arica > Arequipa

January 12th: The rally’s first ever day in Peru. Today is split into two stages separated by a road section, the quirk here is that the second section diverges with the bikes and quads doing extra mileage to their own bivouac, with no assistance vehicles allowed! The riders will have to rely on each other. The bikers were actually due to do more of their own stage mileage but were sent the car route after some dry river beds become a bit less dry.
The cars and trucks follow a similar route for much of the way before heading into the town of Arequipa for the night, where they’ll have access to the usual facilities.

Magazine (3min):

Cyril Despres tells us how to ride in the Dakar.. I can’t imagine doing that for 400km on dirt and sand.

Stage 11 Summary:

Navigational errors for the bikes, and problems too for Robby Gordon despite leading early on.

Standings

Today – Bikes

1. Despres (KTM)
2. Farres Guell (KTM) +1m39s
3. Coma (KTM) +2m01s
4. Aubert (KTM) +3m30s
5. Barreda Bort (Husqvarna) +4m53s

Overall – Bikes

1. Despres (KTM)
2. Coma (KTM) +2m22s
3. Rodrigues (Yamaha) +1h08m40s
4. Svitko (KTM) +1h34m56s
5. Viladoms (KTM) +1h39m46s

Rodrigues and Viladoms took an engine change penalty of 15 minutes. Svitko is up to 4th but is the only one of the top 12 not to have incurred a penalty so far.

Today – Cars

1. Peterhansel (MINI)
2. Roma (MINI) +3m44s
3. Leal Dos Santos (MINI) +8m56s
4. De Villiers (Toyota) +9m28s
5. Novitsky (MINI) +10m15s

Robby Gordon lost 1h50m40s with technical problems which he stopped to try and fix.

Overall – Cars

1. Peterhansel (MINI)
2. Roma (MINI) +22m49s
3. De Villiers (Toyota) +1h11m01s
4. Gordon (Hummer) +2h10m31s
5. Novitsky (MINI) 2h11m10s

Gordon’s loss promotes de Villiers to 3rd, but Robby was lucky not to drop further than 4th thanks to some big time gaps in the top five, but it goes to show that even with these gaps it is important to keep your vehicle running and get to the end. In 6th is Alvarez at +3h53m51s, these stages are really biting now.