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 | SA-Dakar Rally TICKER: Helder Rodrigues wins SS13 - Despres leads again.
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Helder Rodrigues is the winner of Saturday´s stage 13 from Nasca to Pisco in Peru. The Portuguese needed 03:21:16 hours for the 275 timed kilometers, he won only 47 seconds ahead Cyril Despres (KTM), 3:00 minutes to Jordi Viladoms (KTM) and 5:13 mins to Joan Barreda Bort in the best Husqvarna. Yesterday´s overall leader Marc Coma lost 13:25 minutes and finished 18th.
So maybe "that´s It" for the 2012 Dakar Rally - because Sunday there´s only a 29 km "showspecial". Frenchmen Cyril Despres will be the new overall leader - with the help of the organiser ASO, because they gave Despres a time-bonus (for bad driving) and penalted Coma for good navigating and driving in "the mudhole" in SS08.
Nearly exactly with the help of the time-bonus, Despres leads now with 43:01:54 hours, 11:03 minutes in front of Coma. Helder Rodrigues follows 3rd with +01:11:27 hours in front of Jordi Viladoms (+01:41:12) and Stefan Svitko (+01:49:36).
In the quad category, the Patronellis probably took things carefully in the last big special, but their most consistent rival, Tomás Maffei, was no undeserving winner. He took his 3rd scratch this year and confirmed his potential. Just like Sergio La Fuente, who slipped in between the Argentineans to take second in today's stage.
He had already finished second on the occasion of his double whammy in the first two stages, as well as in the Atacaman loop stage around Copiapó. Although this last battle did not change the status quo in the final classification (Alejandro and Marcos Patronelli, followed by Maffei), it did reveal who the contenders will be at the next Dakar.
2012/01/14 | 17:06 CET | ARTICLE: MR/SY/HS
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