Dakar Rally: Stage 14

Paul Carruthers | January 16, 2003

Fabrizio Meoni’s bid for victory in the Dakar Rally took a shot to the gut today as he lost over 22 minutes repairing his Gauloises KTM after a crash. Meoni’s misfortune added to overall leader Richard Sainct’s lead, the Frenchman winning today’s stage by 18 seconds over Cyril Despres on the run from Dakhla to Luoxor in Egypt.

Spaniard Marc Coma ended up third today with Sweden’s Per-Gunnar Lundmark fourth.

Sainct now lead Despres by 11 minutes and 20 seconds in the overall standings with Meoni now over 39 minutes behind.

Paul Carruthers | Editor

Paul Carruthers took over as the editor of Cycle News in 1993 after serving as associate editor since starting his career at the publication in 1985. Carruthers has covered every facet of the sport in his near-28-year tenure at America's Daily Motorcycle News Source.