IN
THE
WIND
P36
GONCALVES CLOSING IN ON COMA
H
RC's Paulo Goncalves rode
his Honda CRF450 Rally to
victory in stage two of the Rally
dos Sertoes in Brazil on Monday,
the Portuguese rider winning the
shortened stage to close in on
overall leader Marc Coma.
Due to hazardous conditions
on the race route, stage two
was shortened from the origi-
nally planned 96.5-mile stage.
That meant that Gonclaves, who
started the stage third, couldn't
whittle down the lead to Coma
and his factory KTM as much as
he'd hoped.
Although he still trails Coma,
the gap is now just 39 seconds.
"Today I set a really good
rhythm on the bike," Goncalves
said. "I was able to keep up a
really quick and constant pace.
However, the organization short-
ened the route and we compet-
ed over a 70-kilometer course,
which meant that I was unable
to make up much time. I would
have been able to win the stage
and pull back."
Second place in today's stage
went to Jean Azevedo on the
Honda Mobil Rally entry. Coma
was third, a minute and 21 sec-
onds behind Goncalves.
Coma leads the overall stand-
ings from Goncalves with Aze-
vedo moving up to third, some
two minutes and 16 seconds
behind Coma. The second fac-
tory Honda, ridden by Helder
Rodrigues, is fourth overall, two
minutes and 52 seconds off the
leader's pace.
T
here's not much you can say about this
video other than some days you just get
lucky. And this guy most definitely got lucky.
VIDEO OF
THE WEEK:
SPIDERMAN?
