
Sébastien Loeb and Édouard Boulanger lead Rallye du Maroc for The Dacia Sandriders as the FIA World Rally-Raid Championship season showdown reached halfway today (Wednesday).
Tricky navigation through the event’s longest stage in terms of timed kilometres made for an ultra-demanding day, which Loeb and Édouard Boulanger completed on top in their Dacia Sandrider.
From starting position number eight, the French pair covered Wednesday’s 323 timed kilometres with the third quickest time, less than a minute behind the stage winners, after a thrilling battle for supremacy.
Having been 4m03s adrift of first place at the completion of Tuesday’s Stage 2, Loeb and Boulanger now lead Rallye du Maroc by 3m25s with two days remaining.
Opening the road following their Stage 2 victory, Nasser Al-Attiyah and Fabian Lurquin made light work of having no lines to follow over a route consisting mainly of sand dunes, dirt tracks and rocky terrain.
They were fourth fastest and climb from seventh to fifth overall after they delivered a remarkable performance given their road position.
In a further boost, Al-Attiyah added two points to his championship total as he continues his pursuit of a fourth consecutive W2RC title.
Cristina Gutiérrez and Pablo Moreno were less fortunate, however, after they were delayed by a navigation issue and tyre damage. The Spaniards were 14th quickest through Stage 3 and occupy 12th place in the overall ranking.
There’s no rest on Rallye du Maroc with the action continuing tomorrow (Thursday) over a timed distance of 284 kilometres.
KEY QUOTES
NASSER AL-ATTIYAH (QATAR), DRIVER, THE DACIA SANDRIDERS : « The performance of our Dacia Sandrider was really good today. We opened the road and we finished as the first car. In my feeling we have a good speed, but it was very difficult navigation today. Fabian did a really good job, he’s a professional, we work together very fast and I’m really quite happy. Today we could have lost a lot of time, but it looked like we had good speed. For me it was very important to finish today and I’m really quite happy if we can take points of the
championship. »
CRISTINA GUTIÉRREZ (SPAIN), DRIVER, THE DACIA SANDRIDERS : « We start to have dust in the front and find a motorbike that was going with problems. We think we miss a corner or something and we get lost with five or six cars at the same time. It was difficult to find the correct way. We tried to come back, and we had a puncture so a double mistake. There was a lot of time lost, but the best thing is we had the rhythm and we are here at the finish of the day. »
SÉBASTIEN LOEB (FRANCE), DRIVER, THE DACIA SANDRIDERS : « The day was really good, the stage was really difficult with a lot of complicated navigation and tricky places. We had to find the right rhythm, but I was pushing hard all the stage. After 200 kilometres I came a bit closer to Mattias [Ekström] and started to be in his dust so I couldn’t go as fast as I wanted. But he was going in a good rhythm still, so we didn’t lose so much time. »
FABIAN LURQUIN (BELGIUM), NAVIGATOR, THE DACIA SANDRIDERS : « Good stage for us today, we make a clean stage. Nasser went like Nasser does, fast and safe. We did a clean navigation together and we bring the car to the finish of the day in one piece. Everything was ideal today, I don’t think we can do much better while opening the road. We did the best we could and hopefully we do another two days like that. You can see Nasser has a lot of experience. He also helps with the navigation when he feels it’s a bit difficult, like a desert fox! »
RALLYE DU MAROC STAGE 3 RESULTS (UNOFFICIAL) – Erfoud-Erfoud
Stage distance: 323km Liaison distance: 3.5km Total distance: 326.5km
3rd: Sébastien Loeb (FRA)/Édouard Boulanger (FRA), 3h30m45s
4th: Nasser Al-Attiyah (QAT)/Fabian Lurquin (BEL), 3h31m40s
14th: Cristina Gutiérrez (ESP)/Pablo Moreno (ESP), 3h41m38s
RALLYE DU MAROC PROVISIONAL ULTIMATE CATEGORY OVERALL RESULTS AFTER STAGE 3 (UNOFFICIAL)
1st: Sébastien Loeb (FRA)/Édouard Boulanger (FRA), 9h46m02s
5th: Nasser Al-Attiyah (QAT)/Fabian Lurquin (BEL), +7m08s
12th: Cristina Gutiérrez (ESP)/Pablo Moreno (ESP), +37m31s
RALLYE DU MAROC: THE BIG NUMBER
323: At 323 kilometres, no stage of Rallye du Maroc is longer in terms of the timed distance than today’s third stage.
THE DAY AHEAD: STAGE 4, OCTOBER 16
Rallye du Maroc’s penultimate stage on Thursday October 16 is based southwest of Erfoud over a route consisting of 284 timed kilometres. It’s being billed by event organisers as the final day of sand dune surfing for the W2RC competitors.
Stage distance: 284km Liaison distance: 92km Total distance: 376km
Linda Hirvonen,