Certainly no one can stop Joan Barreda (Honda) in Morocco. Well…, the 30 minute penalty imposed on him yesterday for speeding may very well prevent him, once again, to grab a race victory.
But in matters of stage victories, he has no equal. Three scratch times in three days. The benefit of yesterday’s victory on the second stage has certainly been withdrawn, in favor of his Honda teammate: Jeremias Israel, but the Spaniard showed who’s the boss ! Behind him, is his other teammate, Paolo Goncalves , who took second place and steals the show from Marc Coma in the general rankings. Third comes Sam Sunderland (KTM)
THE RACE AS IT HAPPENED
“It was a great stage, very physical. Always concentrated”, Barreda said on arrival. “In the first part, there was lot of navigation. After 80 ks (in a special that had 313km), it became very flat, very fast, with lots of bumps. ” What About his penalty ?, “I’ve never seen a penalty like that , in the last 30 years. ” He answers…
The poor performance of the day is Marc Coma’s. Even if he is first to cross the finish line, he conceded 7’18 ‘ to Joan Barreda and above all: 4’48’ Paolo Goncalves, who followed him in at 4’07 “on the day’s overall. Consequently, the Portuguese’s Honda takes the overall lead with 41 seconds ahead of Coma.”It was a long day, difficult. From KM 10, I started to open the track (I was the second to leave this morning behind Israel Jeremias, yesterday’s winner). It was the longest day and most important as we are half way through the rally, but we are heading in the right direction. The first part of the stage was difficult in terms of navigation. Then we had to go faster and faster ofrom the halfway mark, And finally, at the end of the stage it became stony and the navigation was once more complicated. “But we can perhaps explain this relative underperformance in one word: CAUTION. “it was not far from here, two years ago that he fell and broke his collarbone. as a result of this injury, he waived the Dakar.
Asked about the Barreda’s penalty, the KTM rider said. “It’s already hard enough to focused on myself. I do not know the details of what happened to Joan. “
Behind them the gaps widen. Helder Rodrigues (Honda) and Ruben Faria (KTM) were the third and fourth this morning at 5’41 ‘and 7’06 behind the leader, Marc Coma. But today Helder only managed the tenth time in 13’17 ‘ from Barreda and Faria did a little better, with 13’09 “. Barreda is no longer in the fight for the overall rankings.
Goncalves being only 2’30 ‘ from his teammate, Helder, still third overall, is now relegated to 12’21’ from the top of the list. Faria, at 13’33 ‘. ouch ! But clearly a trio of men stands out and one of them, Barreda,, ruled out of the fight for the podium (temporarily at least) the first two seem untouchable. With his win of the day, Barreda climbed a little bit of that long slope. Ninth this morning at 26’38 ‘, he nibbled two and a half minutes. Placing himself at 24’08 “. He says himself, the final victory is now impossible. He can still try to win six scratches…
Sam Sunderland took third place of the day, at 5’22 ‘ from the winner. The new KTM rider, , allows himself even the luxury of catching up with Coma, Already third yesterday, Sunderland still hurting from his first day’s 14’46 ‘mishap he is now fourth overall at 12’29 ” …
