January 6, 2020

Victory for Giniel De Villiers of Toyota GAZOO Racing in stage 2 of the Dakar Rally 2020.

Eurol in Dakar: First victory!

Today stage two of the Dakar 2020 was mainly about rocky ground, with lots of loose stones and sharp rock points.

For all participants this caused some problems, mainly in a hail of flat tires. Within the team, however, there were also plenty of happy faces, as Giniel De Villiers became the winner of the stage, despite stopping at Ten Brinke, which marks the first victory for a Eurol driver in the Dakar 2020! Gazoo teammate Nasser Al-Attiyah only needed 12 minutes longer for the 393 clocked kilometers, good for a neat fifth place. This was the first time that the roadbook had only been handed out very shortly before the stage, which was very well picked up by all navigators, as can be seen from the strong results.

Bernhard ten Brinke and Tom Colsoul ran a flat no less than four times, so they even had to ask a tyre from teammate De Villiers to get to the finish. That took a lot of time, with a fifteenth place for the Dutchman as a result.

Fernando Alonso was introduced to the harsh reality in the toughest rally in the world. He hit a rock, had to wait a long time for the assistance truck and started working with duck tape and tie-wraps. A rather different situation than he was used to in Formula 1.

Stage 2 footage

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Behind the Gazoo cannons, Tim & Tom Coronel also had a strong day with The Beast. In 26th place, they were the second Dutch team in today's rally, a top performance of the twins.

Pascal de Baar also had such a super day in the Renault truck. He even rode in sixth place at a number of waypoints, but at the end of the day he lost some time at a hidden waypoint that many participants had trouble finding. Result: an eighth place with which the Riwald driver was the fastest Dutchman in a lorrie. Immediately after that Mammoet Rallysport arrived, Martin van den Brink and his crew also did an excellent special stage. After a very difficult day yesterday, the Renault C460 Hybrid Edition from Gert Huzink came out of the test today without any problems, so the twelfth place felt rightly as revenge. The Riwald Dakar Team "Fast Assistance" MAN of Ed Wigmans finished 27th.

Peter van Merksteijn did not report any problems at a 51st place in the car classification, which can also be said of Kees Koolen in the side-by-side; former MotoGP driver Jurgen van den Goorbergh navigated him to a strong seventeenth place.

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