Peterhansel closes gap on Sainz
Wednesday, 4 January 2006 20:14Stephane Peterhansel, chasing a third consecutive win, won stage five of the Dakar Rally - but Carlos Sainz remains in control.
Peterhansel's hat-trick bid was thrown off course on Tuesday when the former bike champion took a wrong turn and lost 17 minutes to slide out of the top ten.
But the Mitsubishi driver was back on form to win the 217-mile stage across Morocco from Ouarzazate to Tan Tan.
He clawed back nearly nine minutes on former world rally champion Sainz, who still leads the event overall for Volkswagen despite languishing down in ninth place on Wednesday's stage.
Peterhansel, who is nine minutes off the pace in ninth overall, expects to close on Sainz as the event continues its trek towards Senegal.
He said: "I started 14th on the road behind many cars this morning and managed to make good progress. I lost 17 minutes in Morocco yesterday, but now I have a good chance to make up that time over the next few days."
Bruno Saby's disappointing eighth place meant he dropped out of the top three, slipping to sixth overall.
His Volkswagen team-mate Jutta Kleinschmidt, the only woman to win the Dakar Rally, moved up to second while former skiing star Luc Alphand is third for Mitsubishi.
Volkswagen's Marc Miller moved into contention with the second fastest time, lifting the American up to fourth overall.
In the bike class, Marc Coma held on to the lead despite coming off second best to Cyril Despres.
Despres beat Coma to Tan Tan by almost four minutes but still trails his rival by 85 seconds in the overall rankings. Isidre Esteve Pujol conceded second place to Despres and dropped to third with the third fastest time on Wednesday's stage.
