100% new !
"The stage of desert apprenticeship"
After the last 100km in Morocco, we go into Mauritania and for the last third of the 603km long stage we go off-track, crossing ergs (shifting sand dune of very fine sand) and see camel grass for the first time, a fore-taste of the seven days to come.
Finish in Zouerat, the iron town whose site was determined in 1958, when one of the mining experts who had come to check the place out, threw his hat out of a helicopter (not Hubert's!) to decide where it should be.
The day's difficulty : the first dunes.
TODAY
The leaderboard has taken on
a completely new look.In the
motorcycle category Edi Orioli
has taken the lead from Peterhansel
who is now 7th,after having
encountered several fuel problems.In
second place Jordi Arcorans and third
place to Davide Trolli.Kinigadner's
KTM engine gave up and had to take a
helicopter back to the bivouac and
retire from the race.
In the car section Ari Vatanen punctured a tire and had to continue the race on a rim, he is now 4th overall. Jean Pierre Fontenay and his Mitsubishi won today's stage but Pierre Lartigue is the new overall leader.
Following an enquiry by the Moroccon authorities into the accident that cost Laurent Gueguen's life,they have concluded that the accident was not caused by a mine, as thought.
Thierry Rannou was airlifted to Tenerife, where he remains in a coma, but has shown some signs of improvement.
