Five things we learned from the stage six of Dakar 2023

The sixth stage of Dakar 2023 was reduced in length by 100 km to 358 km, due to a deluge of rain that turned the bivouac in a muddy quagmire overnight. Nonetheless, from start to finish, there was action aplenty and drama at every turn. Here’s what we took away from stage six.

The competitors faced a treacherous route of sand dunes en route to Al Duwadimi during stage six. (Photo by FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images) Source: AFP / FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images

1. Dark day for Audi

For the first five stages, we’ve started our five things with a dedicated focus on the bikes. Today, we start off with the cars and with good reason. The might of Germany taking on Japan in a battle of the manufacturers has been a strong and often controversial talking point of this year’s rally.

Audi’s hybrid challenger, the RS Q e-tron E2, has been making waves on many fronts against Toyota’s trusty workhorse, the Hilux. And the recent rule change by the FIA and the event promoter to hand Audi a power boost of 8kW has left the likes of Nasser Al-Attiyah with raging fury. Although the latter comfortably won the last stage over Audi’s Stephane Peterhansel, the fact that the additional power helped the Audi’s wasn’t lost on the current overall leader.

But things changed quite dramatically overnight. At 212 km, Peterhansel flew over a 15 metre sand dune and landed flat on its wheels, breaking the car’s suspension, knocking out Peterhansel momentarily and leaving his navigator Edouard Boulanger with severe back pain. He was airlifted to hospital for observation, Minutes later, Carlos Sainz Snr crashed at the exact same spot, ripping the front left wheel and suspension off his Audi.

A view of the Audi hybrid of Spain's Carlos Sainz (L) and the Audi hybrid of France's Stephane Peterhansel are pictured after a crash during Stage 6 of Dakar 2023 between Ha'il and Al Duwadimi. (Photo by FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images) Source: AFP / FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images

Sainz attempted running repairs whilst waiting for his service crew to tend to him, but at the time of writing he had yet to arrive at the updated bivouac. As for Peterhansel, his Dakar was over. Only Mattias Estrom remains in Audi’s Dakar attack for this year and he’s one hour and 46 minutes behind Al-Attiyah in fifth place. Stage six was clearly a dark day for Audi.

Audi's hybrid driver Carlos Sainz (R) of Spain walks next to his car after a crash during Stage 6 of Dakar 2023 between Ha'il and Al Duwadimi. (Photo by FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images) Source: AFP / FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images

2. The weather plays havoc once again

The weather has not been kind to the teams and competitors in this year’s event. Much like the sudden rainstorm that hit stage three a few days before, the rain returned in between stages five and six and made the bivouac at Al Duwadimi impossible to set up camp.

This has forced the event promoters to modify the distances of the next three stages, including the one just completed. Nonetheless, it’ll be fascinating to see how each of the competitors adapt to these changes, especially for those who are competing for outright glory.

3. Toby stays within touch of Howes, but can Chucky fight back?

Toby Price and Daniel ‘Chucky’ Sanders both had positive days across the stage and are consolidating their positions heading into the upcoming rest day, as well as the final week of competition.

Price bounced back from his late stage crash near the end of stage five, despite copping a knock to his shoulder that remained quite sore for much of this stage. Third overall for the stage and second outright in the general classification behind Skyler Howes bodes really well for the two times winner of Dakar. And from his perspective, he’s just biding his time and waiting for disasters to happen around him.

Tonby Price finished third on stage six of Dakar 2023.

From Chucky’s perspective, it was a much better day out in the dunes, though he still wasn’t completely 100% fit. Still recovering from his bout of food poisoning, the GasGas team doctors now believe he may have been poisoned from a thorn that is currently stuck on his body from one of the previous stages and will require minor surgery to extract the thorn.

Daniel 'Chucky' Sanders was in better spirits on stage six, coming in seventh. Credit: Federico Romano

Nonetheless, despite a time loss of three minutes, Sanders is still within reach of Howes, sitting only 19’54” behind the American. And knowing Chucky, there’s only one way he’s going to fight back and that’s to go hard for the remainder of this event.

4. Molly is knocking on the door of the top ten in T4

We are continually impressed by the dedication and resilience of Molly Taylor and Andrew Short to fight back the early dramas that befell them in the opening stages.

The South Racing Can-Am pair drove a solid stage overnight to finish 14th for the day, 22’07” off eventual stage winners, Marek Goczal and Maciej Marton. The only issue that they had to deal with was a broken constant velocity transmission belt after 90 km, causing some intermittent driveline issues along the way.

Molly Taylor and Andrew Short now sit 12th overall in the T4 Modified Production SSV class.

Overall in the T4 Modified Production SSV class, they are currently sitting 12th in the general classification and are about 28 minutes from climbing back into the top ten. Not a bad effort.

5. Seven different stage winners in the bike component.

We’ve seen seven different riders take out each of the stages so far in this year’s event. Such is the hugely competitive nature of the Rally GP class, we’ve yet to see our first multiple stage winner. Will stage seven change all that?

Catch the stage six highlights tonight from 5pm AEDT on SBS and anytime on SBS On Demand.