The Golden de Baar Concludes the Elite Ten This Time
15.1.2016
The crews have tackled another very hard stage of the 38th Dakar Rally. Although this year’s Dakar is coming to its end soon, the organizers do not spare anyone. Not only that the eleventh episode was one of the longest, but it was spiced up by the dunes one last time and the extremely fine fesh-fesh sand. Following yesterday’s victory Pascal de Baar brought his Renault Trucks special to the finish on tenth place.
„We need to remain patient, because the stages are very difficult. We’re all aware that the finish is almost within our view, but we need to continue to be extremely vigilant. We could pay dearly for any mistake we make at the moment,“ said the relieved chief constructor Mario Kress.
Stretching over seven hundred kilometres, Thursday’s stage eleven from La Rioja to San Juan was one of the longest this year. The special section consisted of four hundred and thirty kilometres. As a winner of the preceding special section, Pascal de Baar started from the first place. Nevertheless, he passed all of the checkpoints on tenth throughout the section, and that was also his final result. Victory went to the Russian Nikolaev on Kamaz, as he managed to negotiate the track in five and half hours. The pilot driving a special constructed by MKR Technology lost by a 30-minute margin. “We really don’t want to take any risks. We’re not pushing it, so of course this show in the times,“ commented the constructor Kress.
In the overall ranking de Baar sticks to his sixth place with a nearly three-hour loss on the leader, his fellow countryman Gérard de Rooy, who beats Mardeev on second by an hour. It will be up to the former winners of the world’s toughest rally to fight over the title.
There are only two more stages left for the crews. The penultimate stage 12 on Friday from San Juan to Villa Carlos Paz is the longest one on the programme this year. The trucks will have to overcome eighth hundred and sixty kilometres, out of which two hundred and sixty-seven consist the special section.
