The penultimate stage of the Dakar 2018 has been one of the longest stages overall with competitors covering 929kms through the day. Starting from San Juan, Toyotas Nasser Al-Attiyah claimed the 31st stage win of his Dakar career and now equals the race leader Carlos Sainz.
The Qatari driver and two-time Dakar champion, Al-Attiyah finished first with an 11-minute lead at the end of the stage. A special mention must be made of the satellite-Toyota driver, Lucio Alvarez, who finished second in this stage and made it to the top-ten ranked drivers of Dakar 2018.
Stephane Peterhansel, who has been gunning for the lead, chasing Sainz down, hit a tree in this marathon stage, thereby breaking his power steering system and eventually losing more than an hour. He finished 20th in this stage. Also, he has now slipped off the podium and is now running eight minutes behind Giniel De Villers. Running in third position overall, Bernhard Ten Brinke had a sad end to his Dakar campaign, what with not being able to finish the penultimate stage and having to bow out.
