Volkswagen celebrates fifth stage win - three Race Touareg lead

The Spaniards Carlos Sainz/Lucas Cruz (E/E) increased their lead over their two team mates in the overall standings following the duo’s first stage victory and Volkswagen’s fifth so far this year in the 2010 Dakar Rally. Nasser Al-Attiyah/Timo Gottschalk (Q/D) are now second 10 minutes 6 seconds behind the leaders, Mark Miller/Ralph Pitchford (USA/ZA) in the third Race Touareg trail the leaders by a margin of 28 minutes 19 seconds.

The former Rally World Champion Sainz was completely in his element along the small mountain passes from La Serena to Santiago. Stony tracks, tight corners and many braking manoeuvres – the demands were rather more reminiscent of a rally world championship than a desert rally. Nevertheless his task was anything but routine: Sainz won the desert classic’s tenth stage in the Race Touareg with a 28 second margin over Stéphane Peterhansel/Jean-Paul Cottret (F/F) in an X-raid BMW. Another rival in the fight for victory on the day was Volkswagen team mate Mark Miller who even led after having completed 148 of the 238 total kilometres. The American finished third on the day ahead of team mate Nasser Al-Attiyah.

After ten of the events 14 stages of the event the Volkswagen trio hold a considerable advantage at the head of the overall standings: Stéphane Peterhansel/Jean-Paul Cottret (F/F) are 2 hours 14 minutes 20 seconds behind in fourth at the wheel of an X-raid-BMW.

Kris Nissen (Volkswagen Motorsport Director)

"That was a stage like a sprint rally. We set-up the cars differently and selected suitable damping characteristics for the ZF Sachs dampers. As a result, the cars were very agile and fast. My congratulations go not only to the drivers but also to their co-drivers. The navigation was really tricky today also. We can be extremely satisfied with the results but should nevertheless not forget that there is still a long way to go. Everybody must continue to do their jobs faultlessly.”