Fog foils Stage 11 of Dakar

From KTM Racing

Just as the 2009 Dakar was about to leave Peru, cross the Andes and re-enter Argentina for the 11th stage of the rally on Wednesday, organizers announced they were forced to cancel due to heavy fog forecast for the whole route.

The desert coastal areas of Chile and Peru are often subject to fog when cool air comes in from the Pacific and hits the Andes Mountains.

The cancellation came as a disappointment at a time when the rally is entering not only some of the most dramatic scenery but also at a critical stage. KTM factory rider Marc Coma still maintains a comfortable 1 hour 24 minutes and 50 seconds overall lead over the second placed Frenchman David Fretegne. Meanwhile KTM factory rider Cyril Despres finished hot on the rear wheel of Fretegne in Stage 10 and is now just three minutes behind him.

Both Coma and Despres, long time rivals and winners of Dakar Rallies in Africa are very much aware that the race is still wide open. In the last rally held in Africa in 2007, Coma looked a certain winner then crashed in the final stages and had to withdraw leaving second-placed Despres with the prize.

Stage 11, which was to take the contestants from Copiapo to Fiambala, a total of 680km with a special of 215km across the Paso San Francisco and into a sandy landscape not unlike Mauretania, had been billed as the "most majestic" stage of the rally. Organizers announced that because the timing of the stage could not be altered due to the crossing of the Andes and the border crossing between Chile and Argentina they had no alternative but to cancel. Instead participants will now proceed to the Fiambala bivouac in liaison on Wednesday morning.

On Thursday riders tackle Stage 12 from Fiambala to La Rioja, a distance of 518km of which 253km is the special. Back in Argentina and now in the closing phases of the rally, they will have to call upon all of their technical skills to attack a range of dunes, including the formidable "white dunes."