Qatar’s Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah, Spain’s Joan Barreda-Bort and Qatar’s Adel Hussein Abdullah led their respective car, bike and quad categories in the Sealine Cross-Country Rally, round three of the FIA World Cup for Cross Country Rallies, after the opening 4.2km super special stage held near the Sealine Beach Resort, south of Doha, yesterday afternoon.
Al Attiyah and co-driver Lucas Cruz Senra, who set the fastest time, will lead the rest of the 25-car field into the Qatar desert today.
Saudi Arabia’s Yazeed Al Rajhiand Czech driver Miroslav Zapletal were second and third respectively in the cars catergory.
“It was nice to win the stage and ensure that I have a clean track for the start of the first important stage tomorrow,” said Al Attiyah.
In the bikes category, Barreda-Bort was quickest with Portugal’s Helder Rodrigues and Spain’s Marc Coma rounding off the top three.
Qatar’s Adel Hussein Abdullah was the quickest of the 11 quads, with the UAE duo of Obaid Al Kitbe and Atif Al Zarouni in second and third positions.
To prevent riders hanging back on the super special stage in a bid to improve their starting position for the first of the loop stages through the desert, FIM officials imposed a ruling that the fastest 10 riders could choose their starting order – a system similar to the one now used in the FIA World Rally Championship.
Today, competitors tackle the first 330.51km loop stage through the southern extremities of Qatar.
The first bike is set to start the varied stage – 3.42km from the bivouac – at 06:00hrs (07:00 UAE), with the first car joining the competition at 07.15hrs.
A repeat of the 3.42km liaison will guide competitors back to the Sealine campsite. The stage crosses dry lakebeds, gravel tracks, sandy terrain and small dunes, before passing close to the sea on its return to the bivouac. A series of tricky dunes bring competitors to the stage finish. There will be three passage controls with a refuelling point for the bikes at PC2.
