Sporting reward for Sunderland

Arequipa (Peru), Jan. 12: British motorcyclist Sam Sunderland was on Friday promoted to fifth stage winner on the Dakar Rally after sportingly stopping mid-race to help a fellow rider who had fallen and suffered a head injury. Frenchman Xavier de Soultrait, on a Yamaha, had been the first across the line on the run from Moquegua to Arequipa while Sunderland, on a KTM, finished down in

14th place, 7min 29sec behind.

However, the 29-yearold 2017 Dakar champion lost more than 10 minutes when he gallantly stopped racing to come to the aid of Portugal’s Honda rider Paulo Goncalves who was injured in a fall after 155km of the stage.

Goncalves suffered a head injury and a broken right hand, forcing him into the fifth retirement of his Dakar career.

Organisers said stewards decided to hand Sunderland back the 10 minutes he spent at the Portuguese rider’s side, thus making him the stage winner by a margin of 3min 23sec. In the overall standings, America’s Ricky Brabec, on a Honda, leads Sunderland by 59sec with Chile’s Pablo Quintanilla, riding a Husqvarna, at 2min 52sec back as the event heads into a rest day on Saturday.

“It was a mass start day and there was not much to win or lose, but it was unfortunate for Goncalves and I stopped with him,” said Sunderland.

“I stopped for a long time with him, maybe ten minutes, I’m not sure. Then I was back with all the other guys in the dust. I didn’t have any reference of how much time I was losing, so I was thinking that my race was going downhill,” he added.