#Dakar2021 Day 7 NEWS Kamaz Master Rally Team | Stage 7 Ha'il-Sakaka

The sixth stage of the Dakar Rally 2021 in Saudi Arabia was held along the Al-Qaisumah – Ha’il route on Friday, January 8.

For Andrey Karginov's crew of KAMAZ-master, yesterday became a real disappointment. Having lost about 10 minutes in the starting trap, the truck number 500 was coming closer to the leader with every kilometer and made a decisive attack in the final third of the distance, showing the best time at the stage. Unfortunately, the first victory at the Dakar 2021 did not happen: the stewards penalized the Russians for the missed navigation point, and a 20-minute penalty threw Karginov back to seventh place. Arriving at the bivouac, the crew’s navigator Andrey Mokeev told what had happened on the way.

"It was a very difficult day in terms of navigation. A lot of people wandered and quite seriously went off the course – as cars, so bikes and quads. Five trucks met in one place - they confused each other, interfered. It happened, because it was purely my mistake. We missed a hidden point somewhere. We will sort it out not happen this in the future, and try to correct everything. This happened in the area of ​​the fifth or sixth kilometer, where a lot of points were. They are of different levels and caliber. Unfortunately, we missed the hidden point that did not open in the GPS," - described the situation Mokeev.

Thursday turned out really harsh for the Dakar contestants. Experienced navigators of four-wheeled crews and representatives of the bike category noted that the organizers made the stage difficult to the maximum, and navigation - a real lottery, where, beyond knowledge, one had to count on good luck. But that was yesterday. The sixth stage of the rally-marathon promised to be not less extreme.

Everyone who has ever been to the legendary Dakar will say that it exhausts people both physically and psychologically. And as far as moving to the north of the Arabian Peninsula, the weather conditions also change. Nighttime temperatures drop to 8-10 degrees, while sub-freezing values are not rare. Taking into account the fact that many racers have to spend the night not in campers, but in tents, a comfortable rest between starts is out of the question.