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Press Release of the stage

Rallye de Tunisie- Thursday April 7th : Sinawin-El Borma (488 km/ES7: 314 km)

Housieaux Last assault !

 Back in Tunisia for the penultimate stage of the Rallye de Tunisie, the seventh stage of the race ending close to the petrol forage station of El Borma. As soon as the border controls ended, the competitors attacked the 314 km special, along the Algerian border.
Today Dominique Housieaux (Buggy Schlesser) proved the winner in the car category and Albert Hitenaus KTM from South Africa, on his bike did the same. The French driver thus tightening the gap at the top of the overall, where the first three cars have only half an hour between them. Leader from the start Michel Marchini (Yamaha), abandoned the race today, after engine failure. His young team mate Olivier Pain, who came in third today still has a half an hour advantage over Thierry Bethys (Honda 450), in the overall.

 

Terranova Stuck in a ditch. Congratulations were in order for the first four drivers in today : Vigouroux, Housieaux, Monterde and Terranova. Indeed the duel was particularly tight in the high speed section at the end of the stage. The first three had no major concerns, Orlando Terranova in his BMW X3, on the other hand lost a good 10 minutes stuck in a sand ditch.

Hamard’s courage to saluted . Finishing amongst the first fifteen bikes at the end of the special Stéphane Hamard (KTM 660) was obviously in pain, a suspected broken collarbone did not stop the biker from riding the short distance to the bivouac.

Serradori days of glory ! They had the honour of opening the race this morning after finishing first and second in the Idri loop, Mathieu Serradori (BETA) and Alex Anton (KTM 690), soon fond themselves slowing down at CP1. reason: lost !

Cacchiarelli missed the control. Following mechanical problems the Tunisian Marco Cacchiarelli (Yamaha Raptor) up till then leader in the Quad category, had to abandon the race today. Indeed he was at the start of the special, and seemed to have fixed his engine, But he ended up using the assistance track to get to the finish line thus missing two control points and getting penalty points.

Pedro’s marathon. Bianchi Prata (Yamaha 450) was amongst the leaders at the start of the rally. Then things started to go wrong: one of six bikers picked up by the sweeper truck during the Idri loop, when the truck overturned he was taken by the assistance car to Sinawin to work all night on his broken engine. No sooner had he passed the border that the second engine broke down. He managed to repair it and made it just in time for the departure of the special, leaving last, just before the cars. All this without sleep for 48 hours. Well done Pedro!