Dakar Rally title slips out of Lategan’s grasp with finish line in sight

Despite his best efforts in the dunes of Saudi Arabia’s notorious Empty Quarter on Thursday, Henk Lategan and co-driver Brett Cummings lost the Dakar Rally lead which they are highly unlikely to regain with the finish line in sight.

The Toyota Gazoo Racing South Africa (TGRSA) pair lost 8:38 on Yazeed Al Rajhi and Timo Gottschalk on Stage 11 which not only wiped out their overnight lead of 2:27, but means they go into Friday’s final stage in second place, 6:11 behind the Saudi Arabian and his German navigator.

With Stage 12 being nothing more than a ceremonial 61km stretch towards the Dakar Rally finish line in Shubaytah, Lategan all but conceded victory after getting out of his GR Hilux T1+ on Thursday.

Dakar Rally was ‘awesome race’

“That was about what we could do. We could have pushed a bit more here and there and have taken more risk, but the car is in one piece and we didn’t miss any waypoints,” said the 30-year-old Lategan, whose best Dakar finish is fifth in 2023.

“It’s been a very good day for us and an awesome race.”

ALSO READ: Lategan has Dakar Rally title in his sights after regaining race lead

Ford M-Sport pair Mattias Ekstrom and Emil Bergkvist’s time of 4:19:27 was the fastest on Thursday’s 275km timed section. It was the second consecutive stage win for Ford after Nano Roma and Alex Haro clinched Stage 10, the Blue Oval’s first Dakar Rally stage win in a decade.

Ekstrom is 22:34 off the overall pace in third, with yesterday’s runners-up Nasser Al-Attiyah and Emile Boulanger (The Dacia Sandriders) a further 4:16 adrift in fourth.

ALSO READ: Dakar Rally ‘not over yet’ says Lategan after losing the race lead

Baragwanath still in top 10

Al Rajhi, who pilots a similar South African-built Toyota to that of Lategan, finished third on Thursday.
Brian Baragwanath and Leonard Cremer finished Stage 11 more than 40 minutes off the pace in their Century Racing CR7, but managed to hold onto 10th place in the overall rankings.

Saood Variawa, Lategan’s last remaining TGRSA team-mate, and his French co-driver Francois Cazalet finished 36 minutes behind Ekstrom to move up to 21st overall in the Dakar Rally standings.

On two wheels, Michael Docherty followed up his historic stage win from Wednesday by bringing his KTM home 16:13 behind stage winner Tosha Schareina in 17th place. Docherty is still sixth in the Rally2 standings.