Dakar 2022: Macík finished fourth in Dakar. Michek received a mad wound, rescued by good guys from Ecuador

Dakar is one of them. Motorcyclist Martin Michek stood hopelessly at the 127th kilometer for four hours when he destroyed a rim at the front wheel after a hard jump.

“I was pushing for a saw today. I wanted to go ahead, I had a nice ride. Ricky Brabec and I were dragging like dogs, he was a little distant from me. So I wanted to reach him on the plain. But there was a dune that I did not notice, a slope behind it and it sent me into the distance. It was a crazy blow. I didn’t fall, but my rim broke. I can’t go with him because I would kill myself, “he explained on Instagram.

He was already skeptical and was short of pressing the red button, which means you were giving up the race. At that moment, a pair of Ecuadorian racers – father and son Pug – stopped him, while the younger Michek dedicated his bike. “He sacrificed himself for Martin. He has a huge loss, of course, but the point was to get to the finish line and continue the race,” said Ervín Krajčovič, head of the MGR team, for which Michek is racing.

Michek finally arrived with a loss of four and a half hours.

Kevin Benavides won the stage, led by Sam Sunderland. Milan Engel finished 33rd, Jan Brabec was 37th after the penalty. Overall, Brabec is 24th, Engel 30th and Michek 37th.

Of the Czechs, Martin Macík was the most successful in the stage on Thursday, finishing fourth among trucks. Russian Eduard Nikolayev won, but his compatriot Dmitry Sotnikov led the way.

“Damn, I enjoyed it. The stage was harder than they said. Everything hurts, there were huge dunes and we really got wet today. That’s what the Dakar should look like,” said Macik.

Aleš Loprais, who stayed in the middle of the desert due to broken driving on Wednesday, also continues in the competition. The truck, with the help of the service team, got into the bivouac, the mechanics worked on it all night and he sent out a penalty for 24 hours. But the repair was successful and he tries to reach Dakar symbolically. He was eighth on Thursday.

It was also done in the car of Martin Prokop, who suffered a five-hour shortage on Wednesday due to a broken fitting on the gearbox. However, he reached the finish line in the dark and started a night marathon of mechanics. “We won’t give up,” he announced before the start.

He finished 20th on Thursday when he lost 19 minutes to stage winner Carlos Sainz. “Today was beautiful soft sand, so we had fun in the dunes, but a few cars overtook us on fast sections. Then we shifted the shift, and when we needed to go out the big dunes, the engine shut down and we had to turn a few times. We got into a scrum with several cars and had to make room to keep us out of the dust. But finally something happened, “said Prokop.

Nasir al-Attiya still leads the overall standings, having a comfortable 28-minute lead before Friday’s final stage. Prokop is 25th and Miroslav Zapletal is one place ahead of him.