Dakar 2003. Stage 6: Tozeur-El Burma

Roma, Coma and Esteve save a complicated day
Sainct still leading and Roma third, 4.16 behind
 El Borma (Tunisia).- ‘When there were sixty kilometres left, I noticed that something was hitting me on my back. At the beginning I didn’t know what it was, but then I realised that it were pieces of my rear tyre ‘. Nani Roma went today through a stage where he could have lost the race. The rear tyre of his twin-cylinder bike began to degrade very fast while he was leading the special, and ended up completely destroyed. ‘I slowed down the pace hoping to be able to move on, despite loosing some time. I’m happy: I only lost three minutes, that’s not much considering what happened’, those were his comments after arriving in El Borma. Roma was third, behind the winner and leader, Richard Sainct, who took advantage of the fact, that his single-cylinder bike did not suffer any problem. Second fastest was Fabrizio Meoni, who wasn’t as prudent as Roma, attacking until he reached the finish line. In order to finish the following liaison and not having to give up on the highway he had to borrow a tyre from another team. His rear tyre had holes through which you could even see the inner ‘mousse’ – a foam that simulates the tyre pressure. The differences haven’t been big. Roma has lost three minutes and Meoni 17 seconds against Sainct- it could have been worse. The worst are the doubts of the teams with regard to the twin-cylinders if the rally has another stage with so many stones as today. The enormous power of the KTM twin is a guaranty on sand but it’s tough on hard tracks. ‘We knew that this could happen if we had to travel on rocks. Everything will be fine on sand, but if the track gets harder and we have to push.. we’ll have a really bad time’, said Heinz Kinigadner, sporting director of the Telefónica MoviStar Repsol team. Isidre Esteve also had to suffer to finish the stage. His bike ended-up with only one cylinder and he had to finish the stage like that. His mechanics have changed the engine for tomorrow but today Esteve had a really hard time to be able to finish and lost more than half an hour, what has set him back to the twenty-second position of the overall standings. The worst of all is that he is too far behind to help Roma if he has any problem. Esteve is looking forward to the sandy stages, something expected for tomorrow, hoping to make a good stage and get a place behind Roma in the starting order. Marc Coma continues surprising all official KTM riders. He finished seventh fastest today, despite getting lost on several occasions. ‘There is one rider I passed three times. I even apologised the last time I passed him! Every time I passed him I missed the following crossing and had to turn back to the track. Everything is working out perfect for the moment and I’m still learning to read the road book. It’s a shame that I cannot be of much help for Nani if he has got a problem, because our bikes are so different that I can’t even borrow him my rear tyre. Coma is sixth in the overall classification, a day before the big sieve of the rally. If today has been ‘the first authentic special of the rally’, as Sainct said, tomorrow we’ll have the big sieve: 278 kilometres are waiting for the participants between El Borma and Ghadames, 228 of which will be timed. Despite this not being a particularly long stage, the riders will be crossing the first big ‘erg’, a flood of soft and difficult dunes.STAGE CLASSIFICATION1 SAINCT 2.41.42 2 MEONI + 173 ROMA  + 3′ 174 DESPRES + 7′ 08′ 5 COX  + 7′ 29’7 COMA  + 14′ 33’21 ESTEVE + 33′ 01′ OVERALL CLASSIFICATION1 SAINCT 3.50.11 2 MEONI +  2′ 25’3 ROMA + 4′ 16’4 DESPRES + 7′ 30′ 5 COX + 8′ 39’6 COMA + 16′ 28’22 ESTEVE + 38′ 26′