moguls on the other side. That
meant the first thing that hit the
ground was my right leg which
absorbed all the energy in the
landing. For the remainder of
the stage, I had to take it easy.
It's a bummer I'm out, as I've let
the team down, as I felt that this
was the rally for me to shine, but
Dakar is more important."
"I'm happy to have finished
stage one with a good result,"
Branch said. "It was a tough one—
definitely one of the most chal
-
lenging stages I've ever ridden at
Rallye du Maroc! The tracks were
beaten up and washed away from
yesterday's rains, but I managed
to pull through. Nacho [Cornejo]
did an amazing job opening the
track; I can only imagine how
much more difficult it would have
been for him. Opening the stage
tomorrow will be a mammoth
task, but we're pushing forward
with confidence."
"It was good to get the pro
-
logue out of the way yesterday,
that helped us settle back in to
racing and gave me a good start
position for today," said Sanders.
"Stage one started with a load of
riverbeds and stony terrain, so
it was a really good test of the
bike and the improvements we've
made over the last few months.
I made a couple of mistakes
early on, but then quite a big one
at around kilometer 140, which
cost me a couple of minutes,
unfortunately. It's frustrating as it
spoiled all the hard work I had put
in leading up to that point, really.
Other than that, I felt good, and
the speed is definitely there. We'll
see how we get on tomorrow."
Third-place Tosha Schareina
said, "Today was another hard
day at the office, the first 30K
was super gnarly, so I tried to
ride smoothly and with confi
-
dence as it was easy to crash
and damage the bike. I tried to
push in the dunes and taking the
third place today has put us in a
good position for tomorrow."
CN
STAGE ONE (Top 5)
1. Ross Branch (Her)
2. Daniel Sanders (KTM) +0:48
3. Tosha Schareina (Hon) +1:30
4. Luciano Benavides (KTM) +6:45
5. Pablo Quintanilla (Hon) +7:31
KTM's Daniel
Sanders is just 48
seconds behind.
WIND
IN THE
P58
Ricky Brabec had to
withdraw after injuring
his knee.
