Nasser Al-Attiyah extended his lead in the Dakar Rally after taking his third stage victory in six days of competition.
The Qatari, however, was followed closely by his main rival so far, South African Giniel de Villiers, who finished just 37 seconds behind the rally leader in the 277km special.
Al-Attiyah’s victory extended the domination of the Minis, which so far have won all six stages.
Al-Attiyah leads the event by 11m12s from de Villiers and by over 28 from Yazeed Al-Rajhi, who lost over eight minutes today.
Last year’s winner Nani Roma finished the day in third place to continue to climb up the order following his day-one problems.
American Robby Gordon, quickest in the first control point of the day, finished in fourth, less than two minutes behind the winner.
Roma’s X-raid team-mate Orlando Terranova completed the top five, but both men are already out of contention for victory and several hours behind Al-Attiyah in the standings.
Peugeot had another disastrous day and, despite a promising start to the special, Stephane Peterhansel stopped with mechanical problems 143km in.
He managed to reach the finish but lost over half an hour and is now nearly two hours off the overall lead. The other remaining Peugeot, driven by Cyril Despres, lost another hour in the stage.
