Dakar | Al-Attiyah doesn't believe Sainz's punctures: “It's not true!”

The 2024 Dakar began with a battle even before the start of the race, as Nasser Al-Attiyah declared that the Audi would only last three days and return “home”. However, the Qatari had more problems than expected when the race got underway, losing more than 20 minutes to the fastest German car, that of Carlos Sainz.

Furthermore, the Spaniard said he had three punctures which caused him to lose time, although this did not stop him from reaching second place overall, creating a good buffer with the Touareg trophy holder. For his part, the Prodrive driver claimed to have suffered two other punctures, but doubts whether his rival is telling the truth.

When asked by the group of media present at the bivouac in Saudi Arabia, including Motorsport.com, what happened regarding the problems reported by both him and Carlos Sainz, he replied: “It's not true, if he had had three punctures, it would still be there. It's not true, let's forget it, we know who got the puncture and who didn't.”

“It doesn't matter if he had them or not, tomorrow there is another long stage,” explained the Qatari, who in turn recognized the Spaniard's work to recover from his starting position. “There is still a lot of work to do and Carlos Sainz has done a great job, without any problems.”

The winner of the last two editions of the Dakar was forced to complete part of the route without the possibility of pushing hard with these tire problems, and commented: “After the first fifty kilometers we punctured, then we pulled and after eighty, again, a strange thing for me.”

“We had no tires for the rest of the stage, which was another 300 kilometres, and we decided to go very slowly to finish,” the Qatari said. “In the last fifteen kilometers I tried and we managed to set a good time, but today many riders were unlucky and others were lucky”.

“Everyone thought that after 200 kilometers there were black stones, but we didn't pay attention to the sand, which had a lot of stones, and it was a surprise to me,” admitted one Nasser Al-Attiyah.