Yazeed Al-Rajhi: "Our goal is to fight for second place"

Dakar 2022 | Stage 7 | RIYADH > AL DUWADIMI
January 9 ^th 2022 - 17:22 [GMT + 3]

Fifth on the day, 10 minutes down on Loeb, the Saudi is now third overall, just over 8 minutes behind the Frenchman.

"It's a special day when you open the road, but Michael did an outstanding job. We stayed focused and, although we suffered a flat, I'm happy with the result. We were a bit unlucky, but we were also fortunate to finish high up. We were unable to catch Séb, but tomorrow is another day, we'll be starting in a different position and we'll try again. I would love to be in contention for the top honours, but on the first day we all lost 40 minutes looking for a waypoint that Nasser found straight away. He now has a 50-minute lead, so we need him to concede 40 minutes for the rest of us to have a chance! Our goal is to fight for second place. I've got a fine car, a fine co-driver, the roadbook is great, so is the rally and so is the weather, everything is perfect!"