Thursday, January 15, 2009

El Dakaro '09--Stage 12--Wow!!

Amazing....truly amazing...what a race...surely now one of the best, most surprising Dakar's ever.  With Carlos Sainz starting the day comfortably in 1st and the two top Nissan's in 6th and 7th many drivers were just hoping to ease their vehicles into the finish given the massive amounts of attrition that had already taken place.  Then all hell breaks loose...on a stage some competitors were calling the most difficult section of racing Sainz careens into a ravine and totals his Touareg taking the leader out of the race...then Nani Roma's Mitsubishi suffers a mechanical failure ending his race prematurely...And what you are left with is two Americans in podium positions--Mark Miller and his factory VW in 2nd and Robby Gordon and his Hummer in 3rd.  Krysztof Holowczyc and Ivar Eric Tollefsen carefully guided their Nissan Navara's into the finish and have now moved up to a truly incredible 5th and 4th positions respectively.  Really an incredible turn of events.  Before the Dakar started I had hoped for a single top 15 vehicle but to have two now in the top 5 is beyond all hopes for Nissan...Fingers crossed for the final two stages of real racing before the final parade stage!!

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