LA SERENA (Chile): Stephane Peterhansel will be crowned Dakar Rally champion for an 11th time today while French compatriot Cyril Despres should wrap up a fifth motorcycling crown on the day’s final stage.

Defending champion Peterhansel, a four-time auto winner and a six-time victor on two wheels, will tackle the final stage, the short 128km timed run, into Santiago with a 44:38 lead over South Africa’s Toyota driver Giniel De Villiers.

On Friday’s penultimate 441km stage from Copiapo – the longest of the two-week, 8,000km event – Peterhansel finished in ninth place.

“We had to get through this stage without any problems, so there was a lot of stress in the car, first when we were crossing the first dunes,” said Peterhansel.

“We didn’t take any risks at all and we only lost a few minutes, but we managed to protect our lead this way. We know how it goes: something could still happen right up until you cross the finishing line.

“Even if it’s a small special, we still have to get it over and done with.”

American NASCAR driver Robby Gordon claimed the stage honours in his Hummer with his 3’40:53 time, good enough for a 22 seconds advantage over France’s Guerlain Chicherit in an SMG. Chile’s Orlando Terranova, in a BMW, was third.

Despres virtually wrapped up a fifth motorcycling title when he finished second on the stage to open an overall lead of over eight minutes.

The 38-year-old, the champion in 2005, 2007, 2010 and 2012, was 5:25 behind Chile’s Francisco Lopez who has not given up hope of catching his rival on home turf.

With KTM team-mate and overnight title rival Ruben Faria slipping into third in the standings, Despres will go into the final dash into the Chilean capital with an 8:15 overall lead over Lopez.

“The bike race isn’t just about strategy. It’s also about rally-raid sport: we’ve just rode 440km and I was feeling good on the first section,” said Despres.

“Afterwards, I saw that I’d got some time back on Francisco and that he wasn’t going to disappear into the distance over 140km. So I thought I had better be careful with the engine.

“Since I ate quite a bit of dust in the morning, I preferred to make sure and take it easy. But with 690km tomorrow (today), it’s not going to be a walk in the park.” — AFP

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