With the opening of 2023, the Rieju Team riders have faced the first and really real stage of the Dakar rally, with a route that combined fast areas and sandy stretches, to then enter a more technical area through canyons, finishing in the dunes.
Dani Nosiglia, has been at ease in today's stage, carrying out an intelligent race, pressing forward when he could and taking his time in the delicate areas, this managing to finish in an outstanding 17th position, with a time of 04h 27' 08", now stands 16th in the provisional overall standings. Diego Llanos also improved his result compared to yesterday, the Argentinean who enjoyed today's stage, finished 27th scratch, occupying the same position as the rally provisional. 88th position of the day and on the general trankings for Patricio Cabrera, with some technical problems, meanwhile Sandra Gómez, despite losing a few minutes looking for waypoints, finished in 91st position in this first stage of the rally.
#54 Dani Nosiglia:
"It has been a super nice and quite a fast stage, from the beginning I have been pushing as hard as I could, until I reached a point where there were many stones, there I preferred to take a little more care of the bike and watch out not to make any mistakes. The truth is I'm very happy, because it has been a very complete stage, we have had all kinds of terrain. We are working day by day, this first one has been a very long race, happy because so far everything is going well and we are still in the race."
#56 Sandra Gómez:
"I started quite focused, I started a little behind and I wanted to overtake little by little, it was going well, quite hard to get into a rhythm and to go fast because I was not confident in the stretch where there were a lot of rocks. Until the second stage I was going pretty well. By kilometer 237 I was in a group of motorcycles, and some cars passed us by, my sentinel didn't activate and I got a little scared, but we followed them and ended up deviating far to the right. I tried to make some diagonals to try and see if the waypoint activated, but I lost a lot of time. I also had a hard time going through the dunes and in the last kilometers, I was more tired. It's the first day, a first contact, at the beginning I tried not to lose focus because we have seen many riders on the ground, some friends and it's a little hard. In short, well, a pretty hard stage to keep a good pace. Tomorrow more and better."
#29 Diego Llanos:
"First day finished, happy with the stage, no mistakes, no crash. We started from less to more, at the beginning we were bothered by the quad's dust, but we arrived at the end safe and sound, it was a good day to face the second one tomorrow."
#35 Patricio Cabrera:
"A very difficult day, I lost my brakes at km 60. I had to do a very intelligent stage, there was a sector of dunes where I suffered a lot. This is where experience and years come into play, there were 310km where I suffered, I went past over the curves, but the Dakar is like that, it has just started and I will have my revenge, I have positive energy so that tomorrow I can do a good stage".
The second stage tomorrow Monday, SEA CAMP - ALULA, with a total of 588km, 150km of liaison and 430km of timed special, stands out for the narrow tracks between canyons, with technical rocky areas, to finish in the dunes.
*It is important to note that due to the fact that classifications are subject to last minute changes by the organization, these may differ from those published.
