Dakar | Truck, Stage 8: Van den Brink's turn, Macik controls

It was not difficult to predict that Mitchel Van den Brink's day of glory would soon arrive. The Dutchman with the Iveco Powerstar of Eurol Rallysport won the eighth stage of the Dakar reserved for trucks.

The 21-year-old orange takes the second success in his career, after last year which made him the youngest winner in heavy vehicles, and overtakes Ales Loprais into second place overall who finished the special in third place with a gap of 13'45 ”. The Czech had to give up second place against Prague, even if the gap separating him from Van den Brink is just a couple of minutes, so the game remains wide open.

Martin Macik, undisputed leader among the bison of the road with a 1.50' advantage, limited himself to controlling the progress of the stage without trying to force things that could affect his supremacy with the Iveco Powerstar of MM Technology. The Czech didn't look for the final rush like yesterday and, perhaps, preferred to satisfy the thirst for victory of baby Mitchel, who was very competitive in this second part of the marathon rally.

Even today's special which took the group to Hail (the timed section was interrupted by a transfer in the vehicle on asphalt) confirmed Iveco's dominance with five Italian vehicles in the first six places, with only Loprais' Praga breaking a indisputable hegemony. In fourth place we find Janus Van Kasteren with the Powerstar of the MM Machinery team De Rooy FPT: the Dutchman, who led the first part of the raid, before suffering difficulties in the Empty Quarter, demonstrated that he had overcome another a black day like yesterday: Janus, in fact, suffered transmission problems which limited its power when climbing the dunes and, above all, caused annoying vibrations which also caused the wheel bolts that the crew had to tighten to loosen many times.

De Rooy's team at the bivouac managed to restore the vehicle and today Van Kasteren finished less than a quarter of an hour behind Van der Brink, ahead of Vick Versteijnen who is getting used to being in the positions that count and a little behind time he climbed up to fifth place overall.

The same argument made by Van Kasteren can be applied to Michiel Becx: yesterday the Dutchman first suffered the failure of the power steering and then the broken windshield which forced the Iveco crew to eat an incredible quantity of sand, concluding the stage in late at night having had to significantly reduce my pace.

Dakar 2024 – General classification Trucks
Stage 8: Al Duwadimi – Hail
Special: 458 km; Transfer: 220; Total: 678 km