MOTORSPORT: Super chance for Gordon's trucks

Stadium Super Trucks, banned by the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport on safety grounds, will be raced by some of the world's top drivers next weekend in a globally-televised event, the Race of Champions (ROC).

Sebastian Vettel, Helio Castroneves, David Coulthard, Tom Kristensen (the most successful driver at the 24 Hours of Le Mans), NASCAR's Busch brothers, Kyle and Kurt, dual rallycross world champion Johan Kristoffersson and Michael Schumacher's European Formula 3 champion son Mick will be among drivers of the trucks in Mexico City.

Competitors race several types of machinery at the annual ROC, with a 'Nations Cup' on the Saturday and the individual title decided on the Sunday.

Organisers assure the competitors of equal machinery in each category, with American Robby Gordon's troupe of Stadium Super Trucks added to the list this year.

The trucks made a famous Australian debut at the 2015 Adelaide 500 Supercar event (pictured) and continued to run at various events here until last May, when a wheel came off one at Perth's Barbagallo Raceway, hit a pedestrian bridge over the track and landed in the pitlane.

CAMS suspended the trucks from the Gold Coast 600 in October and its decision was upheld in a case in the Supreme Court of Victoria.

The trucks ran later in October at an Australian Motor Racing Series round at Sydney Motorsport Park sanctioned by the Australian Auto Sport Alliance (AASA).

In Mexico City the Stadium Super Trucks (SST) will race (including jumps) in the Foro Sol amphitheatre that forms part of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, home of the country's F1 GP.

ROC president Fredrik Johnsson (who created the event in the early 1980s with Michele Mouton, the most successful woman rally driver and now a top Federation Internationale de l'Automobile official) called SST founder Gordon "one of the most colourful figures in world motor sport".

"Stadium Super Trucks are sure to put a smile on the faces of all the drivers and everyone watching," Johnsson said.

"We have greats racing from F1, Le Mans, IndyCar, NASCAR, Rally X and Formula E, but there has never been a chance to watch them drive anything like this before."

Loeb on charge in Dakar but it's an uphill battle

WRC legend Sebastien Loeb is maintaining his fight for a first Dakar Rally win, now having been fastest on half of the six daily stages in this year's event in Peru.

Loeb's latest success, after the rest day, was his second in a row in his Peugeot DKR 3000 run by privateer team PH-Sport but he is still almost 38 minutes behind Qatari Nasser Al-Attiyah in a Toyota Hilux with four days remaining (predominantly still over sand dunes) before the finish in Lima.

"It's not over yet – there's still a lot of racing ahead of us," Loeb said.

Al-Attiyah said he "made a blunder in the final 15km" of the latest stage, was "not really that comfortable" knowing that Loeb "is fighting and I'll have to battle hard".

Stephane Peterhansel has dropped to third in his X-Raid Mini after giving up more than 16 minutes to Al-Attiyah overnight.

"Victory's slipping away after too many mistakes," said Peterhansel, the 13-time Dakar winner – seven times in cars and six on motorcycles.

"I got stuck in a sand basin (going to assist teammate Nani Roma) and lost 20 minutes."

The Holden ute driven by Victorian dairy farmer Steve Riley with navigator Trev Hanks resumed under this year's revised rules after having retired before the rest day. (Check out Aussie-Holden-Ute-DAKAR-2019 on Facebook for updates).

Australia's 2016 winner of the Dakar's motorcycle section, Toby Price, remains in strong contention this year, little more than five minutes off the lead on his KTM despite an intensely painful right wrist.

"It [the pain] is getting worse. It's going to be hard, but just trying to keep the pace," said Price, who trails Chilean Pablo Quintanilla on a Husqvarna and American Ricky Brabec on a Honda.

KTM has won the two-wheel division the past 17 years.

Marrakesh mix-up costs BMW doubly hard

BMW's drivers bungled a second straight win (and what would have been a historic one-two for the German manufacturer) in the latest Formula E event on the streets of Marrakesh in Morocco.

Portuguese driver Antonio Felix Da Costa and British teammate Alex Sims were out in front nearing the end of the weekend's race when they collided.

That handed victory to Indian team Mahindra Racing's Belgian driver, Jerome d'Ambrosio.

Da Costa, who had won the opening race of Formula E's fifth season in Saudi Arabia for what is now BMW's factory team (but still run in association with America's Andretti Autosport), ended up in the wall in Morocco but accepted blame for the bungle even though he had been leading.

"He [Sims] attacked me [at the end of the main straight], I defended – and I failed on defending," da Costa said.

"I should have just realised that my race was over – I cost him places. It's my mistake."

After the subsequent safety car, the race resumed for a minute and Sims salvaged fourth behind d'Ambrosio, Robin Frijins (Netherlands) and Sam Bird (Great Britain), the latter pair both driving for Virgin Racing.

France's defending champion Jean-Eric Vergne blew his chances by spinning his Chinese team's Techeetah at the first turn, although he recovered to finish fifth.

Britain's Gary Paffett hit Belgian teammate Stoffel Vandoorne's car, putting both drivers in the HWA Racelab team that is seen as the forerunner of the full Mercedes entry next season out of the race.

And Brazilians Nelson Piquet Junior (the category's first champion in 2014-15) and F1 veteran-turned-FE-rookie Felipe Massa clashed in practice, with Jaguar driver Piquet calling his countryman a "f---ing ridiculous amateur".

The Monaco-based Venturi team's newcomer said he had simply been stopped because his car had lost drive.

"He [Piquet] is not a great example," Massa said.

Mahindra's other driver, another F1 refugee Pascal Wehrlein, was furious when forced to retire after just one lap.

D'Ambrosio leads the series with 40 points from da Costa and Vergne on 28, with the next round in Santiago, Chile, on January 26.

Picture courtesy of GTHO/Wikimedia Commons