SUMMARY - Stage12: El Matador looses the battle and De Villiers rises to fame...

Fiambala - La Rioja
After a day of almost forced rest, the contenders still in the race were given a short but demanding day: 213 km including the last sand dunes to be crossed in this 31st edition. That was certainly enough to provide for an unexpected turn of events. It was the case in the car category with the withdrawal of Carlos Sainz, whilst in the bike category, Marc Coma did damage control on his adversaries. Cyril Despres wins his 20th special stage victory in a Dakar and reaches 2nd place in the general standings. In the car category, there was an unwanted new deal inside the VW team: for Carlos Sainz, the dreams of victory have vanished at the bottom of a rio while Giniel De Villiers benefited from the driving errors of Mark Miller to win the stage. The South-African driver is now in the lead of the rally.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• dakar
• sport
• rally
• despres
• sainz
• fiambala
• VW