Australian Toby Price is right back in the hunt for another motorcycle title in the Dakar Rally after finishing third on the fifth and perhaps toughest stage of the race in Saudi Arabia.
The 33-year-old Gold Coast rider finished just one minute and 20 seconds behind a remarkable and courageous winning performance from the new race leader Kevin Benavides on the 465km stage from Riyadh to Al Qaisumah.
The Argentine suffered a fall and may have possibly broken his nose but remounted to take the stage win and become the sixth different leader of the race.
“On one dune I jumped, a big jump, and I crashed because I hit another big one with the front wheel… I cut myself too and started to lose a lot of blood. There was also some pain around my ankle,” said Benavides.
“In the end, I continued and kept pushing with a lot of pain, so, yeah, it was really hard for me today. My nose is broken and also I broke the helmet… I think I’ll be OK for tomorrow. I’m in pain, but it will be OK.”
Benavides’ injury worries will only boost his pursuers, with another fine performance from Price in his up-and-down week enabling the Australian to jump to fourth from eighth overall, now just three minutes 43 seconds down on the lead.
Price, who has won two stages so far, was delighted to make up ground after a testing five-hour slog.
He is just one second behind third-placed Chilean Jose Ignacio Cornejo Florimo and one minute 12 seconds behind second-placed Frenchman Xavier de Soultrait.
“Quite difficult today, the first 300km was tough navigation, I thought Days 1-3 was tough but today was a whole new ball game!” Red Bull KTM factory rider Price reported on Twitter.
“I made a few mistakes but managed to finished 3rd and move up to 4th overall. Bring on Day 6!”
Price’s rookie compatriot Daniel Sanders, on his KTM, finished 15th on the stage and now lies 13th overall.
In the cars’ section, Stephane Peterhansel, France’s 13-time winner on two wheels and four who’s known as “Monsieur Dakar”, extended his lead as South African Giniel De Villiers won the stage.