HAIL: Saudi Arabian Yazeed al-Rajhi won Wednesday’s fourth stage of the Dakar Rally, in which five-time winner Nasser al-Attiyah dropped to seventh overall.

The special stages between Al Henakiyah and Al Ula in Saudi Arabia included 415km of racing.

It ended at a makeshift overnight bivouac where competitors won’t be able to call on their support team bef­ore hitting the road again on Thursday.

Worries about protecting his bike and tyres led Spaniard Tosha Schareina to deliberately surrender the lead near the finish in the motorcycle category.

That allowed Australian Daniel Sanders, who got lost early on, to fight back to take a fourth win in six days of racing.

In the cars, Al-Rajhi led throughout in his Overdrive, finishing in four hours 26 minutes and 40 seconds, 4min 51sec ahead of South African Henk Lategan, the overall leader.

Al-Rajhi moved up to second overall, 6min 54sec behind Lategan in a Toyota.

Al-Attiyah suffered a puncture and then a broken suspension arm. He waited for Dacia team-mate Cristina Gutierrez who gave him the part from her car.

“What else could we do?” said Al-Attiyah “Now the car is fine and we’ll have to adapt tomorrow and next week. My only option is to attack.”

Sanders, on a KTM, completed the stage in five hours 10 minutes and 33 seconds, 15 seconds ahead of Schareina on a Honda. Chilean Jose Ignacio Cornejo Florimo was third, 7min 49sec behind the winner.

The 29-year-old Schareina led by 2 min 30 sec with 32 km to go, and was closing in on the first stage win of his career when he slowed to allow Sanders to pass.

“I lost a couple of minutes so I wouldn’t have to open up tomorrow. I had to be careful with the bike, with the tires, because this is the marathon stage and tomorrow,” said Schareina.

Sanders won the prologue and three of the other four stages so far and leads Schareina by 13min 26sec in the overall standings.

“I got lost a fair bit,” Sanders said. “A little bit of cat and mouse at the end, trying to slow down. And yeah, Tosha was leading and he stopped for two minutes.”

Thursday’s fifth stage is a 428km special from Al Ula to Hail ahead of a much needed rest day on Friday.

Published in Dawn, January 9th, 2025