Dakar 2021 Stage 4 | Dmitri Sotnikov wins stage four, retains first position

Stage 3 winner Maz Sportauto team’s Siarhei Viazovich started the fourth day, an 813km sprint (including the 337km special) from Wadi Al-Dawasir, in the lead. Following him was Kamaz Master’s Dmitri Sotnikov, who had finished stages one and two in P1.

Soon after, however, Viazovich’s Maz 6440RR truck landed into mechanical trouble, which he estimated could have been resolved in an hour or so but took much longer, after which he stayed put at the 100km mark.

Meanwhile, Kamaz Master’s Andrey Karginov snatched the lead after the first time check. Nevertheless, with nine trucks following him all within a meagre minute’s difference, the reigning champion needed to go flat out till Riyadh. Meanwhile, at the last intermediate time check, Russian driver Dmitri Sotnikov put the pedal to metal, overtaking Viazovich in his Kamaz 43509, claiming his third win of the year.

The final standings for the fourth stage, then, were Dmitri Sotnikov with a time of 02:58:47 hours, following by Andrey Karginov (also from the Kamaz Master team) with a difference of 10 seconds, with Maz-Sportauto’s Aliaksei Vishneuski finishing third with a difference of a mere 14 seconds from the leader.

For now, we know three of the four overall leaders are from the various Kamaz Master teams. Let us see if they can retain their positions in tomorrow's fifth day from Riyadh to Al Qaisumah, a distance of 662km with a 456km special.