Carlos Sainz is the winner of Saudi Arabia’s first-ever Dakar Rally having now won the grueling competition for the third time. Sainz who represented X-raid Mini in Dakar 2020 has previously won the rally with Volkswagon in 2010 and Peugeot in 2018.
Spains Carlos Sainz alongside co-driver Lucas Cruz completed the Dakar 2020 in a time of 42h59m17s. Defending Champion Nasser Al-Attiyah finished second just 6m21s behind Sainz.
This is the sixth time in seven years that has secured himself a podium finish at the Dakar Rally.
Peterhansel came in third and now celebrates an amazing 17 Dakar podium finishes.
Formula 1 two-time champion Fernando Alonso managed to finish 13th after suffering a roll at stage 10Â just two kilometers into the stage.
The roll cost Alonso and co-driver Marc Coma 68 minutes in lost time as they tried to repair the vehicle and continue the race. They were forced to also kick out the windscreen.
Alonso is chasing motorsport’s Triple Crown which includes a win at the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix, Le Mans and Indy 500.
There are rumors circulating that Alonso is considering returning to Formula 1 in 2021.
This year’s edition of Dakar was held in Saudi Arabia for the first time. The rally which originally started between Paris and Dakar was later moved to South America due to security concerns in the African region.
This year marks the first time that the Dakar Rally has been hosted in Asia but the inaugural race was marred by Human Rights activists claiming that Saudi Arabia was using the rally along with a long list of major sporting events that they hosted over the course of 2020, to sports-wash their human rights abuses.
This year’s Dakar Rally stretched over 7,500km of harsh dessert split up into 12 stages starting from Jeddah and ending in Qiddiya.
