Photo by: Riwald Dakar Team
“This is Le Dakar…. ”
Today’s special stage was a loop around Copiapo, with a total length of 444 km, split in two parts. The first part mainly consisted of gravel roads and big rocks! The organisers already announced that the second part was going to be one of the toughest parts of Le Dakar 2012: with high dunes and deep, soft sand and steep cliffs!
Today it was break it or make it and the Riwald Dakar Team did relatively well. Especially Bernhard ten Brinke delivered a great result with 10th place, while team mate Gert Huzink arrived not much later in the bivouac in Copiapo in 20th position. However Erik Wevers had technical problems and had to be rescued by the GINAF race truck of Richard Huzink, but Erik lost several hours!
stage: tough and nice, but we made it all through without major issues. We tested a bit with the tyre pressure and that worked out alright. Driving in the dunes is really a very nice experience and you can not compare it with anything else in motorsports!” And like Gert Huzink earlier this rally, Bernhard admitted that the experience of his co-driver, French Matthieu Baumel, is a strong asset to the team: “Matthieu is a real coach for me and gave me the right directions through the dunes today and that boosted my confidence.” Bernhard and Matthieu are going to enjoy the rest day in a solid 13th position in the overall ranking!
Gert Huzink enjoyed the dunes
Also Mitsubishi Racing Lancer driver Gert Huzink and his co-driver Eugénie Decré had another good day. Gert Huzink: “This is how Dakar is supposed to be: tough and demanding – but we are not here for a tourist trip! The first part was relatively easy, but than we had to ‘conquer’ the dunes. As Bernhard explained it is important to have the right tyre pressure. With the low pressure we went ‘super’ through the lower dunes, but than it got steeper and we had a puncture!
When writing this post are Erik and Richard not within, we put a comprehensive piece about them online tomorrow!
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