Belgian Guillaume de Mevius claimed stage six behind the wheel of a Mini as the Dakar Rally resumed on Saturday after a rest day.
Defending bike champion Ricky Brabec took the honours on two wheels, the Honda rider coming in ahead of Adrien Van Beveren and Jose Ignacio Cornejo after the 605km special from Hail to Al Duwadimi.
It was a good day for the Mini team with De Mevius followed home by his Portuguese teammate Joao Ferreira, with five-time champion Nasser Al-Attiyah in third.
“We had a good stage, finally! Our goal was to claw back some time and pick up points for the championship, so we gave it everything we had,” said De Mevius.
“My car still bears a few scars from last week and today we did a bit of flying, but thankfully we didn’t hit anything.”
South African Henk Lategan crossed in seventh to maintain his position at the top of the car standings by four minutes from local Saudi driver Yazeed Al Rajhi.
Al-Attiyah is placed fourth, 16 minutes adrift.
Among the bikes, this was American Brabec’s 11th Dakar career stage win.
“Yeah, the first day on the second week is a long day. They like to make you get a little bit of rest and then put you right back into it,” Brabec said.
Overall bike leader Daniel Sanders kept his powder dry on Saturday, crossing the line in ninth as he aims to put his foot down on Sunday’s seventh stage.
“I got off to a bit of a rough start, getting a little bit lost at the beginning and just trying to get back into the rhythm after the rest day,” he reported.
“But, yeah, it was important not to go too good today because I think tomorrow’s a difficult stage, so I didn’t want to push and get up the front. So, hopefully we’re in a good starting position for tomorrow and, yeah, we’ll be back in the rhythm.”
Sanders leads the bike standings by almost a dozen minutes from Spain’s Tosha Schareina with Brabec fourth, over 23 minutes adrift.
One of the favourites for the bike title, Ross Branch from Botswana, suffered a heavy fall early in the day and was forced to withdraw.
