Ford drivers occupy the top five positions in the Dakar Rally

After three stages have been completed, Ford Raptor drivers hold a remarkable quintuple lead in the race. The top position has been taken by American Mitch Guthrie, who was also fastest on Tuesday’s stage, which was marked by punctures. On the stage lasting just over four hours, winner Guthrie built a gap of just over two minutes to his team-mate Martin Prokop, who finished second.

“I’m excited. This was my first stage win in the top category. I didn’t even expect this. We drove a very clean day and didn’t have a single puncture, even though the stage was tough. Kellon (co-driver Walch) did a great job and we kept moving all the time,” the 29-year-old American driver summed up.

“We were smart enough and took the rocky sections cautiously. We pushed when it was possible. I think we managed the situation really well.”

In the overall standings, Prokop has moved up to second, but the gap to rally leader Guthrie is only 26 seconds. Third place is held by Mattias Ekström ahead of Carlos Sainz and Nani Roma. Five Ford drivers fit within four minutes in the results.

Also making the top eight are Dacia drivers Lucas Moraes and Cristina Gutiérrez, as well as Century driver Mathieu Serradori. The race of multiple Dakar winner and pre-race favourite Nasser Al-Attiyah suffered at least a small setback on Tuesday’s stage. Al-Attiyah lost over 20 minutes and dropped from the rally lead to tenth place.

However, Al-Attiyah is still just over 11 minutes behind the leader, so in a long race the gap is not yet too significant. The campaign of Sébastien Loeb, who is chasing his first Dakar victory, has also once again got off to a difficult start. The Dacia driver, plagued by punctures, is in 12th place overall. He has lost almost 17 minutes to the lead.

“This doesn’t really seem to suit us. We’re driving at 20 per cent of our capacity so that we don’t suffer punctures, but they just keep happening. We had two punctures after 100 kilometres. Yesterday there were none, even though I drove in exactly the same way. When you get two punctures and still have 300 kilometres to go, the rest of the stage ends up being at a crawling pace,” Loeb complained.

The Dakar Rally ends on 17 January.

Dakar Rally standings after 3/13 stages: