Dakar Auto, stage 6: Sainz reconfirms himself at the top. End of hope for Al Attiyah | FormulaPassion

First day

The sixth stage of the Dakar was the first in the history of this competition to take place over the course of 48 hours in the Saudi desert, which began yesterday with the first twist relating to the abandonment of the leader of the general classification Yazeed Al Rajhiforced to withdraw for damages sustained following an accident. In a black day for Toyota, and it was mainly Audi who took advantage of it, especially with Carlos Sainz. The Spaniard, making the most of his strategy, finished in the lead right in front of his teammate Mattias Ekstrom, with the Swede followed by the two Prodrives of Al Attiyah and Loeb.

Second day

The story that led to the conclusion of the sixth stage of this edition was different, the last before the rest day scheduled for tomorrow before the restart scheduled for Sunday 14 January. In fact, he won Sèbastien Loebhis second stage success this season, but the excellent performance of Sainz of the previous round, combined with 2nd place today, allowed the Spaniard to confirm his new role as leader of the general classification, obtained just yesterday. If an accident took away Al Rajhi's hopes of winning this Dakar, the second part of the sixth stage also took them away from the reigning champion Nasser Al Attiyah. The Qatari, accomplice a mechanical failureit has indeed lost almost three hours of time for repairs, thus falling to the bottom of the table. Ekstrom's performance was still positive, thus guaranteeing a general classification with two Audis in the lead, with Loeb following in third position. Finally closing the top-5 are the two Toyotas of Lucas Moraes and Guillame De Mevius,

Dakar 2024, Car ranking – Stage 6 (Top-10)

Dakar 2024, General car ranking after stage 6 (Top-10)