Pablo Copetti: “If you don’t finish, you can’t win”

Dakar 2022 | Stage 3 | BISHA > AL HENAKIYAH
January 4 ^th 2022 - 13:05 [GMT + 3]

The Americano-Argentinean quad rider won the day’s special and also took the lead in his category, with an advantage of 2’ over Frenchman Alexandre Giroud.

“It was a nice stage. I’ve won the stage, so I’m happy and now I’m maybe first overall. It was a fast day with nice dunes, but I rode carefully because I didn’t want to have any crashes. I was just focused on my strategy which was to catch the two guys that started in front of me. I did that and I finished with them. I’m so happy. It’s a long race to be taken day-by-day. This was my stage, that’s how I planned the race. I was just three minutes behind Kancius and then at refuelling I was four minutes in front. It’s a pity because I don’t like anybody having to retire, but now I have to ride an intelligent race and just be focused on taking it day-by-day and finishing. If you don’t finish, you can’t win – you can’t do anything, so my idea is just to finish the race and to be consistent every day. It’s a long race. I’ve been in this position last year, in 2017 and I know that I don’t have to be crazy, I just have to focus every day, just to ride carefully, ride safely and complete all the way points”.