Daniel Sanders has seen his overall lead reduce to 11 minutes and three seconds after Stage Eight of the 2025 Dakar Rally, but it’s all according to plan.
Sanders finished the stage in seventh and copped a speed penalty that added extra time to his overall total.
In an interview after the stage, Sanders said it was very, very tricky at the beginning and he lost a lot of time early on.
“After that, I got into a really good rhythm and the navigation was easier but you had to be really switched on because we lost so much time at the beginning. It was really important to stay focused all day and push all the way to the end. Opening a lot of the stage was good and I had a really good rhythm. I felt comfortable and happy with the technical navigation,” he said.
“It was a good finish, a strong finish compared to a bad start. Hopefully we’re in the middle of the top 10. It would be nice to start in sixth or seventh or somewhere near there for tomorrow. I think tomorrow’s going to be the last difficult navigation day before we head down to the Empty Quarter. It was good to start up front today and we’ll see how we finish up tomorrow,”
“I’m happy with the position where we are and I’m sure it will be good. Tomorrow’s going to be a really important stage, same as today – every day’s been important. So, tomorrow will probably be just as important as the rest.”
