The 2024 Dakar has just gotten underway, but the first actual stage, which led from Al-Ula to Al Henakiyah with 414 timed km, immediately brought about some important twists between the bikes. After yesterday's feat, which led him to victory in the Prologue, also giving him the provisional leadership, the Spaniard Tosha Schareina has already seen his dreams of glory go up in smoke.
The new arrival in the official Honda team was performing an excellent performance today too, but after 240 km he unfortunately ended up with his wheels in the air. In the fall, the Valencian suffered a broken wrist, which forced him to raise the white flag.
And it was right here that the stage reached a crossroads, because Ross Branch, who up until then had led the day's classification with his Hero, stopped to provide first aid. Once the doctors reached Schareina, the Botswana rider set off again, but far behind, despite knowing that the race direction would have to give him back around 25 minutes once he reached the finish line.
At that point the stage became an all-American battle between Ricky Brabec and Mason Klein. The boy from Kove was the first to reach the finish line, and he was also able to take advantage of the 6'21″ of bonuses that were up for grabs today for those who opened the track, because it was he who opened the group for practically all the riders. over 400 timed km.
However, this was not enough for him to get the better of his compatriot from Honda, who in the end took the lead, even if for just 25″. However, a leadership that was only virtual, because Branch appeared behind them at the end of the timed section. with a delay of 16'10″ and this means that in reality the stage and the top of the general classification will be his when the race direction gives him back the time lost to help Schareina.
Branch will not be the only one to regain minutes from the organization, because Joan Barreda and Sebastian Buhler had in turn stopped at km 82 to provide aid to Joaquim Rodrigues, who was airlifted to the Al-Ula hospital: even if his condition was stable, there was a feeling that there were fractures.
Regardless of this, one cannot help but applaud the South African Bradley Cox, who with the KTM of the Bas World KTM Racing Team had finished just two minutes behind Brabec, preceding the other official Honda of Josè Cornejo. Both climbed the rankings in the final kilometres, taking advantage of another twist: in fact, Michael Docherty was among the protagonists of the day. For him too, however, the race ended at km 318, due to a fall from which he emerged with a sore hip. For this reason he was in turn airlifted to Medina hospital.
In the top positions of the day there is also room for Romain Dumontier's Husqvarna and Lorenzo Santolino's Sherco, followed by two “ranking” men such as last edition's winner Kevin Benavides and Daniel Sanders. A little further back there is also Pablo Quintanilla, who crashed his Honda without consequences.
Other important names such as Adrien van Beveren, Sam Sunderland, world champion Luciano Benavides and Toby Price are all out of the top 10, although to have a definitive ranking, especially from a general perspective, we will have to wait for the revisions to be made with the return of time to all the pilots who provided assistance. At the moment, however, Branch's stage success can already be taken for granted.
As for the Italians, the best was Paolo Lucci, 24th of the day with the KTM of the Bas World Racing Team. However, Tommaso Montanari was also close, credited with 28th with Fantic, about half a minute behind his compatriot.
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