Dakar | Motorbike, Stage 9: van Beveren wins, but Brabec extends

The Hondas also made their voice heard in the ninth stage of the 2024 Dakar, characterized by 417 kilometers with a rather varied surface between dunes, sand and rocky sections, which led the caravan from Ha'il to Al-Ula. The fastest of the day was the leader of the general classification Ricky Brabec, but it was his teammate Adrien van Beveren who celebrated, who thus achieved his second stage victory in this edition of the Saudi marathon.

In reality, the French driver had arrived at the finish line with a delay of 4'54″ compared to the American, so he was even third in the standings. What made the difference, therefore, were the bonuses, because by opening the track for long stretches van Beveren was able to shave 5'36″ off his time of the day and thus jumped 42 seconds ahead of Brabec.

Not bad anyway for the latter, who managed to consolidate his leadership, because this time his rival Ross Branch was unable to keep the same pace. In fact, the Hero standard bearer finished with the fifth fastest time of the day, 7'09″ ahead. The curious thing is that now his gap is the same in the general classification as well and leaves the door open for the feat with still three days race to face, because for a manufacturer like the Indian one to beat a giant like Honda would be a truly extraordinary feat.

However, it won't be easy at all for him, because he is literally surrounded by Japanese bikes: today's stage victory has brought van Beveren closer to his tail, given that he is now third at 11'16″. And, even if he lost some shots today, finishing only seventh at 10'07″, Nacho Cornejo is also firmly in fourth position at 13'46″ from the top.

Without forgetting that HRC has an important wild card to play on a strategic level in Pablo Quintanilla. Due to the problems suffered in recent days, the Chilean is now out of any classification game, but he can give his teammates a good hand in the individual stages, going on the attack and opening the track. Today, for example, he set the third stage time at 4'29″, ahead of the best of the KTMs, which was Toby Price, who instead finished with a gap of 6'44″.

In the general classification, however, the best among the standard-bearers of the Austrian brand is still the winner of the last edition, the Argentinian Kevin Benavides, today only sixth at 8'13″, despite being able to count on 3'26″ of bonuses for having opened the track in the first stages of the special. Now his overall gap is 28'02″, but he maintains a margin of just over seven minutes on his Australian teammate. Therefore, one might hypothesize that the battle for victory is now restricted only to the top four.

Further back, however, there was an exchange of positions between Luciano Benavides and Daniel Sanders, with the Husqvarna world champion taking seventh place in the overall from the Australian of GasGas. The latter had started today's special very well, because after 110 km he was third, but then he gradually lost ground, eventually accumulating a gap of over 21 minutes. Overall, therefore, he remains last, less than an hour behind the leader and has also been overtaken by the Argentine, who is eighth in the stage today.

Quad: Giroud tries to reopen the games

Even though it has now turned into a long head-to-head between the top two, the race reserved for the Quads also seems likely to remain wide open until the end. Alexandre Giroud, in fact, did not give up on the idea of ​​bowing to Manuel Andujar and at the finish line in Al-Ula he beat him by 5'13″.

The French rider, who is chasing his third consecutive victory in the Dakar, therefore reduced his gap in the general classification compared to the Argentine to 6'13″, but in this he was also helped by a two-minute penalty which was imposed to the leader at the end of today's test.

Everything unchanged behind them, with the Slovakian Juraj Varga further consolidating his position on the podium, finishing third on the stage and gaining over half an hour on his direct pursuer Laisvydas Kancius, on whom he now has a margin of over two hours in the general classification.

Dakar 2024 | General Moto ranking after Stage 9