Wolfsburg (11 January 2009). Volkswagen started the second week of the Dakar Rallyexactly the way the first half on Friday before the rest day had ended: by securing a triplestage victory and maintaining its previous one-two-three lead. The day’s best result wasclinched yet again by Carlos Sainz/Michel Périn (E/F), who scored a fourth stage victory inthe Race Touareg, thus further extending his overall lead.
On the eighth leg from Valparaíso to La Serena in Chile the German Volkswagen duoDieter Depping/Timo Gottschalk reached the destination in second position with a 4.02-minute gap to Sainz/Périn; they were followed in third place ten seconds later by MarkMiller/Ralph Pitchford (USA/ZA) in the third of the blue Race Touareg vehicles.
In fifth place, Giniel de Villiers/Dirk von Zitzewitz (ZA/D) finished the day’s special stageacross partially narrow gravel stretches but lost 10.48 minutes to Sainz on the 652-kilometre leg. In the overall classification Villiers is now trailing his Spanish team-mate by10.57 minutes, while Miller continues ranking in third place with an 18.05-minute gap.
Volkswagen’s best immediate rival, Mitsubishi driver Nani Roma, in fourth place overalldropped by a further 4.15 minutes to a 33.31-minute gap to Sainz.
Volkswagen Motorsport
