Giniel de Villiers and Dirk von Zitzewitz didn’t have the best first day back in the office after finishing the first stage of the 2014 Dakar rally in 27th place.
The famous duo made up for it by clawing their way back to sixth place after a successful second section between San Luis and San Rafael, where they set the third fastest time of the day.
The Hilux pickup, which is prepared and run by Hallspeed for Imperial Toyota in South Africa, ran like clockwork on the fastest stage of this year’s Rally Dakar. It recorded an average speed of 109,3 km/h over the 433km of special stage, including the famous dunes of Nihuil.
“We are back in business! We had a perfect stage today, made no mistakes, and so were able to make up a bit of ground. It was the perfect response to yesterday’s difficult day. The dunes of Nihuil were particularly soft this time, and extremely difficult to drive. On top of that, the temperatures in the cockpit were extremely high. As such, the first two days were really testing for us. The gap at the top today shows the extent to which the diesels are dominant – we could not have done anything better. Despite this, we never give up and will try to make up more ground tomorrow,” said Giniel de Villiers.
The second stage victory went to well-known Dakar veteran, Stéphane Peterhansel.
Results: Dakar Rally overall classification after second leg of the rally:
01. Stéphane Peterhansel/Jean-Paul Cottret (F/F), Mini, 6h 17m 02s
02. Carlos Sainz/Timo Gottschalk (E/D), SMG, 6h 17m 30s
03. Nasser Al-Attiyah/Lucas Cruz (Q/E), Mini, 6h 21m 12s
04. Joan Roma/Michel Périn (E/F), Mini, 6h 21m 21s
05. Orlando Terranova/Paulo Fiuza (RA/P), Mini, 6h 25m 33s
06. Giniel de Villiers/Dirk von Zitzewitz (ZA/D), Imperial Toyota, 6h 34m 12s
07. Christian Lavielle/Jean-Pierre Garcin (F/F), Haval, 6h 38m 01s
08. Krzysztof Hołowczyz/Konstantin Zhiltsov (PL/RUS), Mini, 6h 54m 10s