Best News Network

Al-Attiyah retains Dakar Rally title, Benavides wins motorbike sprint

Issued on:

Nasser Al-Attiyah won a second straight Dakar Rally just kilometers from his Qatar homeland on Sunday.

His fifth Dakar title eclipsed Ari Vatanen’s total and was second only to Stephane Peterhansel, the Dakar’s greatest champion with 14 wins, eight in the premier car category.

Al-Attiyah led the Dakar for the last 13 of its 15 days in Saudi Arabia, from the Red Sea to the Arabian Gulf.

Sebastien Loeb, the nine-time world rally champion chasing his first Dakar success, was second in successive years, more than 80 minutes behind.

Lucas Moraes of Brazil was third, the first rookie on the podium in 35 years.

Argentine rider Kevin Benavides won his second motorbike title by beating KTM teammate Toby Price by 43 seconds after more than 4,000 kilometers in one of the closest finishes in the rally’s history.

They were the last riders to start the 136-kilometer 14th stage on the coast east of Al-Hofuf.

Benavides, trailing Price by 12 seconds overall, wiped that out by the first checkpoint. By halfway, he was nearly two minutes ahead of the Australian two-time champion. Price came back but Benavides won the stage by 55 seconds.

He won in 2021 and was up front last year until his engine blew on stage 10. Like Al-Attiyah, Benavides was in the top three from stage three, but made his biggest push on Saturday after stopping to help stricken teammate Matthias Walkner, the 2018 champion.

(AP)

Stay connected with us on social media platform for instant update click here to join our  Twitter, & Facebook

We are now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@TechiUpdate) and stay updated with the latest Technology headlines.

For all the latest Sports News Click Here 

 For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! NewsAzi is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.