Today, another edition of the Rally of Morocco ended, the last rally in the Cross-Country Rallies World Championship, of which Marc Coma was crowned champion two weeks ago in Egypt. This was the Repsol rider’s debut on the KTM 450 Rally, the bike on which the Catalonian rider will tackle the forthcoming Dakar Rally and on which Coma won three stages, finally ending in third place despite a 30-minute penalty for not correctly passing through the waypoint in the second stage.
After completing the 2,300 km that made up the 2010 edition of the Rally of Morocco, almost 1,600 of them timed, Repsol rider Marc Coma finished behind Cyril Despres and Helder Rodrigues, putting in another good performance that helped him to reduce his disadvantage with three stage wins over the last four days. Coma, who was second at one and a half minutes behind in the first stage, was the fastest on the second day with an advantage of more than two minutes over the rider in second but he failed to correctly pass through a waypoint (he passed ten metres away from the exact point where it was registered that he had passed through) and was given a 30-minute penalty.
On very varied and demanding terrain, the Repsol rider left behind the mountain and technical tracks and the famous dunes of the Moroccan dessert, showing skills at the handlebars that allowed him to take three of the remaining four stages and make up some of the time lost in the overall standings. A comeback that finally earned him the bronze in Morocco and although victory slipped through his fingers this time, his first impressions of the new bike on which he will tackle the 2011 Dakar are very positive.
Marc Coma,
“Since the penalty in Tuesday’s stage, I knew that this rally was lost. However, I’ve given my all over these few days. We should be happy with the feelings we have had on the new KTM 450. It’s an easy and manageable bike, which makes me feel optimistic about the forthcoming Dakar. What happened on Tuesday was a real shame but we made a good comeback, even though we were only able to take third in the end. Now we have some more tests ahead of us and I think that they’ll be very positive”.
