Stéphane Peterhansel leads Peugeot treble in a nightmare stage for Toyota

Stéphane Peterhansel claimed victory in a dramatic third stage of the 2017 Dakar Rally. The defending champion lead a treble for the Peugeot Team, followed by his teammates Carlos Sainz and Sébastien Loeb.

According to many, Dakar Rally 2017 officially got underway on Wednesday with the first real navigational stage testing drivers and co-drivers alike.

A 780km route through Argentina from San Miguel de Tucuman to San Salvador de Jujuy, featuring a 364km special stage, tested even the most experienced campaigners.

Alongside the navigational difficulties, weather and altitude played a big role with the riders and drivers climbing as high as 5000 metres and seeing an estimated change in temperature from 36°C to 5°C.

Cars

Nasser Al-Attiyah had been very consistent in the race so far and it was all going so well for the Toyota Gazoo Racing leader until kilometre 414 when his Hilux suddenly stopped with a technical issue.

Having been a man on a mission earlier in the day and leading the stage despite Peterhansel getting off to a blistering start, his situation turned serious when he appeared to lose a wheel but he continued to fight and try and nurse the car home.

Carlos Sainz finished nearly two minutes back, with Sébastien Loeb in third and Cyril Despres in fifth as Team Peugeot dominated the day, while another race favourite Giniel de Villiers added to Toyota’s problems by also stopping towards the end.

Overall classification after Stage 3:

Bikes

Joan Barreda hit his rivals with a veritable hammer blow on this third stage. On all out attack from the very first kilometres of the special, the HRC rider soon opened up an impressive gap. He reached the first time check point with a 20-minute lead over the struggling Toby Price. The Australian lost command of the general standings to Barreda whilst Sam Sunderland made the most of a tough day to finish 13:29 behind the Spaniard and overtake Paulo Goncalves in the general standings.

By winning his 14th stage victory on the Dakar, Barreda equals the great Fabrizio Meoni’s number of triumphs and is only one stage win behind Richard Sainct.

“Today was one of the days that we picked and we prepared for it from yesterday to attack. It was a really tough stage but I kept my focus during all the stage”, Joan said.

In losing more than 34 minutes to Joan Barreda on his third day of the rally, Xavier de Soultrait spoiled his fine performances on the first two days. The Frenchman is now at the wrong end of a gap that will be difficult to close on his main rivals, even if all is not lost yet.

Overall classification after Stage 3:

Quad

Gastón González has grabbed his first stage victory on the Dakar in San Salvador de Jujuy following a perfectly controlled stage from start to finish. The Argentinean beat Ignacio Casale by 4:41, but the Chilean is still top of the general standings. Josef Machacek finished almost 10 minutes behind the stage winner.

Overall classification after Stage 3:

Trucks

There wasn’t much to separate the trucks during the third stage but it was Eduard Nikolaev of the Kamaz team who prevailed. The Russian, a former winner, overcame Martin Kolomy by 48 seconds but the Czech driver retained the overall lead in the general standings with Nikolaev now a close second.

Overall classification after Stage 3: