MOTORSPORT: MINIs burst out of blocks on Dakar

MINIs have jumped defending champion manufacturer Toyota in the 42nd Dakar Rally.

Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiyah – the reigning winner expected to excel on the sand dunes of Saudi Arabia, where the marathon event is being run for the first time after its origins in Europe and Africa and then a decade in South America – had three punctures on his HiLux late on day one.

The surprise leader after the trickier-than-anticipated opening stage from Jeddah to Al Wajh in the country’s north-west is 32-year-old Lithuanian Vaidotas Zala, driving his fifth Dakar in a MINI after finishing 12th in a Toyota in last year’s event in Peru.

Australia’s two-time two-wheel winner Toby Price leads the motorcycle division on his KTM, despite losing his road book. After a two-minute penalty, Price’s lead over American Honda rider Ricky Brabec is only five seconds.

The famous event retains the name Dakar, the capital of Senegal, which for the first three decades was its finishing point.

The man known as ‘Monsieur Dakar’, Stephane Peterhansel – 13-time winner on two and four wheels – had communication difficulties last night, having an English-speaking co-driver for the first time, and trails X-Raid MINI teammate Zala by more than two minutes.

Spaniard Carlos Sainz – a dual winner of both the World Rally Championship and the Dakar, and father of the McLaren Formula 1 driver of the same name – is third, almost three minutes behind Zala, in another MINI.

Al-Attiyah is fourth, more than 5½ minutes in arrears of the leader, and Bernhard Ten Brinke of the Netherlands is another minute back in another HiLux.

Fernando Alonso, the Spanish dual Formula 1 world champion making his Dakar debut, is just outside the top 10 in his Toyota but already almost 15½ minutes off the lead.

The first leg for the more than 500 competitors in five divisions – with trucks, quads and side-by-sides as well as the cars and bikes – was 752km, with about 320km of it competitive.

However, the third Dakar for Frenchman Romain Dumas – a multiple winner of America’s Pikes Peak hillclimb as well as the 24 Hours of Le Mans – is already over.

His DXX buggy, based on the 2016 Dakar-winning Peugeot 2008 DKR, burst into flames just 65km into the rally, belching plumes of black smoke, but he and co-driver Alexandre Winocq escaped uninjured.

Zala is first driver to win a Dakar stage in a four-wheel drive MINI since Finn Mikko Hirvonen in 2016.

Sheik Khalid Al Qassimi, a member of the royal family of the United Arab Emirates, was vying for the lead with Zala heading into the final stretch of the stage in his privateer Peugeot before losing more than 15 minutes.

South African Giniel de Villiers and Spaniard Nani Roma, both past winners, were in the wars, the former finishing with a slow puncture on his Hilux and the latter losing more than 20 minutes in his Borgward.

Peterhansel is competing with English-speaking Portuguese co-driver Paulo Fiuza after plans for his wife Andrea to navigate for him were scuttled by her health issues.

The French superstar said he had “wandered around a bit and must have lost three to five minutes looking for a hidden waypoint”.

“The directions were hard to understand in English … I must be going soft in the head.

“In 21 editions of the Dakar I’ve never had a co-driver talk to me in English, so I need to get used to it.

“There were dunes, sandy plateaus and rocky sectors where we had to walk on eggshells.

“[But] we’re good at adapting to these conditions. We’re nimble.”

Price said he was “in good shape, feeling good and happy” but it had been a “strange” opening day.

“My road book walked out on me after 15-odd kilometres,” Price said.

“I was quite lucky in one way because I managed to follow on some dust and just keep up with the guys.

“Once the road book is gone then you're pretty much driving blind.

“At the moment it [his position] looks good … but it's still a long rally to go.”

The 401km stage tonight will take the field to Neom, a planned futuristic city being built on the Red Sea.

The event will finish in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, on January 17.