Dakar Rally: Simon Marčič celebrated victory in the heaviest category

Author of the article: , published January 11, 2023.

The racers of the Dakar Rally completed the 624-kilometer long stage today, which they finished with a 114-kilometer sprint, and after Toni Mulac's excellent achievement yesterday, our second representative at the rally, Simon Marčič, shone today. Marčič completed the speed test with a time of 2 hours 8 minutes and three seconds, which was fast enough for 39th place overall, but the Maribor native was convincingly the fastest in his Original class, the toughest class of racers who compete without a team. With today's achievement, he advanced to 54th place in the overall classification, where he is 11 hours, 49 minutes and 16 seconds behind.

"For the first time in my career, I won in the most difficult class, the original class," Marčič said after the stage. "It was great. 110 kilometers of dunes without stops. This is the terrain that suits me."

After yesterday's eighth time of the test (initially he finished it in sixth place, but later the organizers corrected the results), Mulec completed the course today with the 30th time in the overall classification, behind the winner, Ross Branch, by 16 minutes and 55 seconds, and so retained 26th place in the overall ranking. Adrien Van Beveren set the second time and Michael Docherty the third. Mulca's 2 hours and minutes were enough for the eleventh place in the Rally2 class, where after 10 stages of the rally he holds the ninth place. Kevin Benavides, who was fourth at the finish today, leads the overall standings among motorcyclists. Second place is held by Skyler Howes, and Toby Price is third, two minutes and ten seconds behind.

Four shorter but very difficult stages await the racers until the end of the rally. Tomorrow they will complete a 427-kilometer stage, which will end with a 274-kilometer speed test.

Among the motorists, Sebastien Loeb celebrated his fourth stage victory, taking third place overall. Last year's winner Naser Al-Atijah maintained his convincing lead, while second place is taken by Lucas Morales, who is 16 minutes ahead of Loeb.

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