Villa Carlos Paz, Argentina - Dakar Rally legend Stephane Peterhansel closed in on another title on Friday, holding the overall race lead as Mikko Hirvonen snatched victory in the 12th and penultimate stage.
Peugeot driver Peterhansel, with 11 Dakar titles to his name - six on motorcycles and five in cars - held a 40m59s overall advantage on 2014 winner Nasser Al-Attiyah, who clawed back 11 minutes on Friday.
Hirvonen, competing for the first time, claimed his first stage win as he negotiated his Mini over 931km - 481km timed - between San Juan and Villa Carlos Paz in Argentina. It was the third victory for a Mini in his year's race with Al-Attiyah also winning two stages.
The Finn clocked 5hr 34m7s to finish nine seconds ahead of Al-Attiyah with South African Leeroy Poulter third, 45 seconds adrift in his Toyota Gazoo Racing SA V8 Hilux.
Poulter took the lead from the first waypoint in the 481 km-long stage between San Juan and Villa Carlos Paz, and only relinquished that position nearly five hours later, within half an hour of the finish.
Their charge came to an end, however, when they caught up with team-mate Giniel de Villiers who was fighting a battle of their own at the time.
"We ran into the dust of Nani Roma and his Mini after about 250km,” explained De Villiers after completing the mammoth stage, “and we were trapped behind him for the rest of the route."
Then Poulter fell foul to a tightening corner, which he couldn’t see in the dust. He went off the the road and lost two minutes extracting the Hilux from a deep rut.
De Villiers ran in second for most of the stage, slipping a little to finsh 57 seconds behind the winner - good enough for fourth on the stage, and more importantly, good enough to cement his third position overall.
THICK DUST
Yazeed al Rajhi in the third offiical Toyota entry posted the 11th-fastest time of the day, 11m50s behind the stage winners. He battled to make up time, mainly due to the thick dust that hung over Stage 12, but managed to retain his 10th position in the standings.
Mark Corbett in the leading Century Racing CR5 buggy also struggled in the dust, finishing 30th for the day, almost an hour behind the leader - but still made up one place to 17th overall!
Team-mate Colin Matthews came in 47th, which moved him up two places two 39th in the overall standings, while Sean Reitz in the Red-Lined Nissan Navara - 39th for the .day - gained three places to 37th overall.
MOTORCYCLES
Portuguese rider Helder Rodrigues, riding a Yamaha, lead the motorcycles ahead of Australian race leader Toby Price on a KTM.
Rodrigues clocked 5hr 57m24s to finish 7m32s ahead of Price with Argentinian Kevin Benavides third, 7m55s off the pace on a Honda.
Price, 28, was poised to claim his first Dakar victory in Rosario on Saturday, holding a 37m39s advantage on Slovak team-mate Stefan Svitko, with Chilean Pablo Quintanilla third overall on a Husqvarna, 53m10s adrift.
Antoine Meo had been holding third before the longest stage of the 2016 Dakar Rally but dropped to sixth overall after falling and losing half an hour.
Sole surviving South African motorcycle entry Kobus Potgieter finished 2hr 26m24s behind Rodrigues, 80th out of 84 still running, to retain his 81st position overall.
Brian Baragwanath, however, lost one place, dropping to fourth in the dogfight for quad honours, after finishing sixth on the stage, 16m15 off the pace, while Rhide SA team-mate Ted Barbier imprved his personal best stage result with 12th, consolidating his 22nd position in the overall standings.
AFP