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Issue #10:January 12, 2022
On Monday January 10, the stage took the teams south from Al Dawadimi to Wadi Ad-Dawasir. A 395 km SS was held along the way on mountainous terrain and the two TLC Toyota Land Cruiser 200 cars safely reached the finish with the following rankings and showed their strength. Ronald Basso and Jean-Michel Polato in car #245 came in at 46th place overall and 1st in the production car category while Akira Miura and Laurent Lichtleuchter in car #242 came in at 47th overall and 2nd in the category. As of today, this brings the cumulative ranking for car # 242 to 39th overall and to 43rd for car #245.
The 2022 Dakar Rally left Riyadh on the previous day and headed to south-central Saudi, where the rally continued on soft sand amongst dust storms in the desert. Today, they travelled a 166.45 km liaison from Al Dawadimi to start the SS from a mountainous area at an elevation of around 1,000 meters. The terrain was sandy and some small sand dunes were present from early in the stage. Overall, sand was soft on this stage and some difficult sand dunes also made an appearance. After the midpoint, they passed through canyons and wadi (dried up riverbeds), and in the end they climbed the kind of rocky terrain usually seen in trials, before reaching the finish. Once they reached the finish for the SS, a 268.94 km liaison took them to the bivouac in Wadi Ad-Dawasir, bringing the total distance covered for this stage to 830 km, the longest in any one day for this rally.
Car #242 took full advantage of their tires by TOYO TIRES and the excellent grip they provide on sand. The sand was especially soft in the first half, so tire pressure was dropped accordingly. They got stuck once, but safely made it to the finish. As for car #245 which fell from a dune yesterday during the SS, the car was unaffected thanks to flawless repair work by the team of mechanics. As a result, they were able to clear this difficult stage without getting stuck or suffering any punctures.
Tomorrow on Tuesday January 11, a loop SS from Wadi Ad-Dawasir is planned. It looks like it’s going to be another unforgiving stage with soft sand.
Miura (driver): This was the most difficult sand dune stage we’ve seen in Saudi Arabia so far. We suffered a puncture right before the sand at the beginning of the stage. The sand dunes after that were intimidating, but we lowered our tire pressure in the difficult areas, and we managed to clear the stage. I’m a little disappointed about getting stuck, but I’m happy we safely made it to the finish.
Basso (driver): It was a difficult stage with soft sand, but in the end, we made it through without getting stuck or suffering any punctures. I’m happy that we were able to complete the stage without any trouble. When we dropped from the sand dune yesterday, I hurt my back a little, but I’m already OK.