Defending Dakar winner Yazeed Al-Rajhi explains disastrous opening stage

Key Highlights

• Even without the penalty, however, the Overdrive Toyota driver still lost nearly 13 minutes to de Mevius.“At a tricky section with many canyons, we chose the wrong one, even though Timo had the right feeling,” Al-Rajhi explained. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“We decided to try it anyway.
• Thanks to the dust from other competitors, we managed to find the correct route again, but it was too late.
• Not an ideal start to the Dakar Rally and a big time loss.”#201 Overdrive Racing Toyota: Yazeed Al Rajhi, Timo Gottschalk#201 Overdrive Racing Toyota: Yazeed Al Rajhi, Timo GottschalkThat was not the only issue, as Gottschalk explained after the opening stage.“We already had two punctures early on, before taking the wrong canyon at a difficult point,” the German added. Taking the wrong turn ultimately led to missing a waypoint, which resulted in the time penalty for the crew. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“Although we were back on the correct route quite quickly, we unfortunately validated the next waypoint and therefore received the penalty.
• Not a good start, but there is still a lot of terrain ahead of us and we certainly won’t give up.
• We will try to recover as much ground as possible over the next 12 stages," he said. On Monday, Al-Rajhi and Gottschalk will get their first opportunity to bounce back from the disappointing opening stage.