De Baar seventh, Huzink is definitely out of the Dakar

7.1.2023

While Pascal de Baar finished in seventh position in Friday's sandy 6th stage without much difficulty, his colleague Gert Huzink is saying goodbye to this year's 45th year for good. The winner of the 3rd stage, after the exhausting work of the technicians, entered the sixth stage, but did not finish it.

For two days, the technicians were busy with a demanding repair of Gert Huzink's engine. They looked for a spare part, but that didn't work either, so the North Bohemian technicians decided to repair the cylinder head themselves. They were successful and the Dutch pilot of the Riwald Dakar team was back in the game after a one-day break. "We have not slept for two days, it was exhausting, but we were incredibly happy when Gert started the stage. It was also great to see him getting closer to the podium. These are the moments when you are proud of what has been achieved," MKR Technology team designer Mario Kress described the challenging moments.

But the joy lasted one hundred and fifty racing kilometers. "The first part went well, but then we started to lose power and at the mandatory stop we didn't start the engine. Subsequently, we discovered that sand got inside. This is how the final end came," stated Gert Huzink, who has been plagued by bad luck since the very beginning of the competition. Despite that, he managed to win the 3rd stage. But now he really ends in the race.

Friday's stage from Ha'il was shortened to 357 kilometers and the crews headed straight to the bivouac in Riyadh after it. The original bivouac in Al Duwadimi could not be "unpacked" due to the rains, so the organizers decided to send the entire field further on. In the end, young Mitchel van den Brink won the stage. Pascal de Baar, leading the stage completely on the sand in the dunes, finished in seventh time when he got stuck on one of the dunes, but with the help of air cushions the crew managed to free themselves from the trap. "The seventh time is not bad. We can still compete with the top, so we'll try again tomorrow," de Baar is looking forward to the next stage.

Aleš Loprais is in the lead. Adwin Hoondert is seventeenth and Pascal de Baar is nineteenth in overall ranking.