Skyler Howes: “we did a really good job from the refuelling all the way into the finish”

Dakar 2023 | Stage 9 | HAIL > ALULA
January 10 ^th 2023 - 12:20 [GMT + 3]

 The general rankings leader after the rest day managed to retain his status despite a day that was just as difficult as the previous ones. However, Toby Price is now just 3 seconds behind the American in the general rankings.

 “The stage today was pretty tricky. We hit a section where we were missing one WPC. It was really full of lots of stones and deep with mud, so it was really tricky to navigate through there. I kind of new that we were going off of the cap heading, but more or less had to do some circles. That’s where my team-mate Luciano caught up with me, so I knew I’d lost some minutes there. In the very beginning, in the dunes there were some dune cuts and I was actually kind of nervous right through there, so I didn’t really go too fast and I was really bummed out to see Barreda on the ground. From then on, I was taking it easy. Once we got out of the dunes and stones and onto the faster tracks, me and Luciano just put the charge on, because I know we’d lost some minutes in there. I was thinking that I’d lost a lot more time than I did, but we did a really good job from the refuelling all the way into the finish of the special, so when we passed there it looked like Luciano was in front with me just behind by a few minutes. It as a demanding stage, for sure, with lots of water. It was super crazy. We were going through giant rivers in the middle of the desert. We knew after the rest day that it would be just as challenging and today we had many more challenges thrown at us. So now we head all the way down to the Empty Quarter and I assume it’s going to be the same, with more and more challenges down there”.