For the first half of the 333km special near Ha’il in Saudi Arabia, Al-Attiyah came under serious pressure from the three Audis, with the German marque’s lead runner Stephane Peterhansel sitting just six seconds behind him after the first 120km.
However, Audi’s challenge began to unravel en route to the next waypoint, with 14-time Dakar winner Peterhansel the first driver to drop out of contention after suffering heavy damage to his RS Q e-tron in an accident.
With the rear axle broken and the left-rear suspension taking a big hit, the Frenchman has been waiting for more than four hours for assistance trucks to arrive to repair the damage.
But Audi’s troubles didn’t end there as Carlos Sainz Sr soon lost more than two hours in search of a tricky checkpoint near the end of the stage, having already dropped six minutes behind the leaders with unrelated issues in the middle part of the day.
With Mattias Ekstrom also falling behind in the third Audi as the stage neared its…
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