Michek suffered a bad accident, Šoltys taken to hospital: what did the sixth stage of the Dakar Rally bring?

The legendary Dakar Rally continued with the sixth stage and the best of the Czechs is still Aleš Loprais. On the other hand, Martin Michek suffered an unpleasant crash and Martin Šoltys had to be transported to the hospital. How are the Czechs currently doing in the Dakar?

A decent result today for Martin Prokop. He finished eighth in the car race and he is also eighth in the overall standings. He lost five minutes and forty-five seconds to the winner of the sixth stage, Argentine Orlando Terranova.

The leader, Nasser al-Attiyah, finished tenth in this stage but is still clearly at the top of the standings. Saudi Arabia’s Yazid Rajhi has moved into second place ahead of Sébastien Loeb.

During the sixth stage, Prokop fought with Sweden’s Ekström. However, the latter ended his run in the sixth stage in an excellent second place.

“Erzeta was special. It was fast again and I was sick of it. But we enjoyed the last forty kilometres in the beautiful dunes. Mattias Ekström caught up with us, I caught up with him and rode on his bumper,” said the Czech rider after the finish.

“Then we found a checkpoint faster than the others at the end of the race, and a couple of cars got hit. Today we improved our mood,” he added.

Ales Loprais was again successful in the trucks. He did a little better than yesterday, but he is almost 30 minutes short of the podium. Loprais is still fifth in the standings, with Janus van Kasteren ahead of him by less than two minutes.

The truck category is still dominated by Russia’s Sotnikov, who has a ten-minute lead over second-placed Nikolaev. Anton Shibalov, in third place, is 28 minutes behind second place. Loprais’ compatriot Martin Macík saw the finish as ninth in the standings.

Unfortunately, Martin Šoltys suffered a hard crash and even called for medical help and had himself transferred to hospital with a sore back.

The sixth stage, however, was not a pleasant one for two Czechs – Martin Michek and Martin Šoltys. The former had an accident with a car on the morning crossing to the start of the special, but this was not entirely Michek’s fault. In any case, the bike was damaged and his teammate Milan Engel helped him with repairs at the start.

However, after 100 kilometres the stage was stopped due to the impassable route. Michek ended up in thirty-ninth position with a loss of twelve minutes, but remains nineteenth in the standings.

Sources