Luciano Benavides is the big winner of stage 5 of this Dakar Rally, benefiting from Adrien Van Beveren’s penalty to finish the day in first place. Looking ahead to the second half of the race, the Argentine said ‘I feel better than ever’.
At the end of today’s stage, which took 4h53m, the KTM rider made his first winning start to the current edition of the Dakar and his feelings are very positive, as he explained, while already looking ahead to the second half of what remains to be raced:
– I hope the strategy is going to be favourable to me in the second week. I’m happy with the bike and my pace. I feel better than I ever have. But, on his race, some decisions are made that call into question the strategic choices prepared several days before. That said, all in all, I’m still in the game and there are still many kilometres to go.
Benavides is currently in seventh place with a total of 30h44m30s run, to which are added two minutes of penalties. He is 24m05s behind the race leader, Daniel Sanders, his teammate.