In the duel already being fought by Marc Coma and Cyril Despres, the Catalan took a very slim advantage in the 4th stage of the Personal Dakar Argentina Chile, on a day on which the rally entered Chilean territory. This morning, the Spaniard was the first at the starting line, the most delicate position on the Dakar, because by definition, the competitor opening the way has no tracks to follow. That said, Coma has already shown his expertise in navigation in addition to his skill behind the handlebars.
Summary stage 4 - 2011/01/05
Over 200 kilometres of the route, he started by distancing Despres (32” behind after 81 km), who then in turn made up for some of the time lost on the second part of the route. In Calama, Coma still managed to maintain an edge, with a time 16” quicker than his main rival. The provisional outcome shows the extent to which the two masters of the discipline can manage to neutralise each other. After 1,220 km of timed sections so far, Coma only holds first place by a slim gap of 2 seconds, whilst both men have 2 stage victories each.
Behind them, “Chaleco” Lopez would surely have liked to enter Chile as a winner, just like he did the first time the Dakar visited his country. However, his starting position (11th) made it a difficult task. In total, he still managed to grab the 3rd best time of the day on his Aprilia, trailing Coma by 2’05”. An increasingly regular performer at this level, Olivier Pain took 4th position, like yesterday, 6’20” behind the stage winner, but the 12 minute penalty given to the Yamaha rider on stage 2 pushes him back to 12th place in the general standings. For the moment, the fight for the third place on the podium, currently occupied by Lopez, is taking place 20 minutes behind Coma.
The KTM 450 Rally is leading the race
Though the Argentineans continue to dominate the quad category, the distribution of roles is changing. Marcos Patronelli has finally withdrawn from this third Dakar before leaving his country. He leaves his older brother to battle to try and succeed him in the race’s roll of honour. However, today it was a newcomer to the rally, Tomas Maffei, already winner of his first stage yesterday, who took the lead in the general standings. He sits atop a 100% Argentinean podium with a lead of 1’54” over Patronelli and 3’11” over Halpern.
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