It’s ZAFs in P1 and P2 on the stage going through WP7. De Villiers and Baragwanth bossing the stage. Hope it lasts to the end.
Imagine if Lategan was still in it - we could have possibly been looking at an all South African stage podium. 
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They’re through the next waypoint, Baragwanath increased his lead over Peterhansel to 01:24!! This is looking like it might just happen!
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Geniel de Villiers take the final checkpoint in the lead, with 58 seconds over Baragwanath. The top 6 have all crossed the line, so unless Roma who was running in 7th at the penultimate checkpoint can make up 9 minutes, the results are safe!
I should be noted that Carlos Sainz started 4th, but had a horrible first stint and ended 28 minutes behind de Villiers, in 49th place. He pushed really hard, finishing only 15 minutes behind the leaders!
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Some photographers caught Lategan’s crash:
Really glad they got out relatively unscathed, that could’ve been nasty!
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Its because they drive a Hilux. One of those Minis and it would have been a different story 
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 5 in the Cars:
It was South Africa Day at the Dakar today. First off, the sad withdrawal of super promising Rookie Henk Lategan after a huge end-over-end rollover accident early on the stage today. (Pics up there ^). Thankfully Henks’ injuries are manageable (broken collar bone) and his co-driver, two time Dakar motorbike finisher Brett Cummings, was uninjured. Based on his performance in the four stages he did complete, I have no doubt that Lategan will be back to try conquer Dakar again next year. And no doubt that he’ll be winning stages and taking podiums again.
In happier news, two of the remaining three SA driven cars took charge of Stage 5 from the start, and whipped it into submission.
Giniel De Villiers is among the most experienced drivers on the Dakar and was able to avoid the many pitfalls on stage five to reacquaint himself with victory. Behind the wheel of his Toyota, the South African took the lead at the first time check point and was never under threat. He completed this 456-km long special 58’’ ahead of his countryman Brian Baragwanath, who has picked up another podium finish this year following second place on the prologue.
Also a decent day for Shameer Variawa who finished the stage in P28 which helped him move up the overall rankings again.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 5:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 | +5 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 20:06:52 | +01:38:50 |
| 12 | +13 | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 20:25:28 | +01:57:26 |
| 42 | +4 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 24:28:34 | +06:00:32 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 6 in the Cars:
Tough day in the heavy dunes of central Saudi Arabia on the way to the half way point and a much deserved rest day.
All 3 South Africans had a decent day. Perhaps not as epic as yesterday, but good nonetheless. Brian and Taye went P6 on the stage and moved into the same spot overall. They have 15 minutes on either side of them, plenty opportunity to push into the Top 5 in Week 2.
After their stage win yesterday, Giniel and Alex finished P8 on the stage today, and move back into the Top 10 overall. They’re now well over 2 hours behind the lead time, but with some consistent running next week, there’s still an outside chance at another Top 5 Dakar finish for GdV.
Another solid stage also for Shameer and Dennis who finished the stage in P16 (their best stage finish so far?) and helped them move up a full 10 places on the overall board.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 6:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | +3 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 24:04:35 | +01:50:32 |
| 9 | +3 | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 24:26:15 | +02:12:12 |
| 32 | +10 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 28:42:36 | +06:28:33 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 7 in the Cars:
Really kak start to Week 2 for the Baragwanth/Perry challenge - a hidden rock in the soft sand really early on the stage broke a rear suspension linkage and has destroyed their hopes of retaining their Top 10 position. Unable to make repairs on the course as no-one seems to have the parts they need, the pair are hobbling their way slowly towards the stage finish.
The hope is that they’ll be able to make the cut-off and get to the bivouac safely. At the moment, the Live Tracker shows them through Waypoint 7 (at Kilometer 242). With another 200km to cover, they are already almost 7 hours behind the stage winner, so it’s going to be tight. If they lose 12 hours to the leaders overall, they’ll be able to resume tomorrow from around P40 overall. After getting to the Rest Day in P6, that’s going to be a tough result. (I’ll update this post once we hear what happens with them.)
Another decent day though for Variawa - P15 on the stage, and he moves up to P31 overall. De Villiers had more of a challenging day and only managed P22 on the stage. Even so, Baragwanth’s misfortune means he moves up to P8 overall.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 7:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | +1 | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 29:36:26 | +02:59:36 |
| 31 | +1 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 33:42:52 | +07:06:02 |
| 51 | -45 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | TBC | TBC |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
Forgot to mention that today is Day 1 of the 2-day Marathon Stage - no mechanics to support them at the overnight stop and only the spares that they can carry or can get from others. If they do make the cutoff time, Brian and Taye have a very, very long night ahead of them still
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Despite the live times not showing them after WP7 last night, the live position tracker did. From what I saw and could work out, they got to the end of the Stage a little before 11pm here last night. They’re still not showing on the Stage 7 results list though, so I don’t know.
The start list for today’s Stage 8 does have the Baragwanath CR6 scheduled to start from P54 at about 10:15. I’m taking that as a positive sign that they made it before cutoff and can continue on the rally 
but we’ll have to wait and see to be sure.
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Good news - the Century Racing team are up and running on Stage 8! And judging by their time through the first Waypoint at Km40, their repairs were top notch - P14 through the waypoint, under 3 minutes slower than Al-Attiyahs P1 time.
It’s a shortish stage today with 375km on the Special, and another 334 of Liaison. Hopefully the repairs hold and they are able to recover some of the lost time from yesterday.
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That’s incredible, well done to them!!
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Ouch. Guayasamín’s ExtremePlus Polaris is going to need a pretty big plaster to fix that.
The lead cars are through the Special already. Another stage win for Al-Attiyah (by just 52 seconds though!) Provisional stage times look like Variawa had a great run today (currently P7 on the stage), de Villiers lost another 30-odd minutes to the leaders (currently P17), and Baragwanath is almost through and doing very well (live tracker has him P12 through the second last waypoint, about 60 kilos still to go).
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 8 in the Cars:
While we’re waiting for the day’s highlights video, here’s the Dakar Heroes clip featuring Taye Perry hanging out the car to keep an eye on their suspension repair:
And here is that highlights clip:
What a recovery drive by Brian Baragwanth and his co-driver Taye Perry! After the 12+ hours yesterday, making the cut-off with minutes to spare, and a self-repaired suspension linkage, the pair were immense on today’s short 375km stage. Despite starting way down in P51 and having to contend with all the traffic ahead of them, the pair managed to finish the stage in a very credible P12, just 24 minutes slower than the stage winner. Very impressed with them.
De Villiers had another iffy day in his Hilux, finishing the stage in P19 and giving up another 30 minutes to the leaders. He drops to P9 overall, and is going to have to work hard to stay in the Top 10 for the rest of the rally.
Best of SA on the day honours for today though for Shameer Variawa and Dennis Murphy. They whipped their Hilux into an excellent P7 on the stage, their best stage finish so far. Their great performance today is enough to move them in to the Top 30 overall.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 8:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 | -1 | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 33:03:39 | +03:26:50 |
| 28 | +3 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 36:58:39 | +07:21:50 |
| 38 | +13 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 41:39:20 | +12:02:31 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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I go nowhere else for my Dakar fix every day 
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 9 in the Cars:
Neom > Neom : 465km Special / 579km Total
Today’s stage was a 465km loop from and back to Neom on the Red Sea coast. The area provides for some incredible scenery:
Racing-wise, another all-round excellent day for all 3 of our South African teams. de Villiers was back on top form and chased his way to a very close P3 on the stage. Baragwanath finished a minute and a half behind him to claim P5 on the stage. And Variawa had a decent enough run to go P18 on the stage.
On the General Classification Giniel maintains his P9 overall, and Shameer and Brian both move up a couple of spots. With this momentum, we could be seeing a Saffer in each of the Top 10, Top 20, and Top 30 finishers this year. Just three more stages to go.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 9:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 | = | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 38:06:25 | +03:40:09 |
| 24 | +4 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 42:21:41 | +07:55:25 |
| 35 | +3 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 46:43:38 | +12:17:22 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 10 in the Cars:
Neom > Al-Ula : 342km Special / 598km Total
Another visually stunning day on the Dakar route that saw the competitors head south from Neom, down the Red Sea coast and slightly inland again, to the town of Al-Ula.
Team SA had another solid day through the changeable terrain. De Villiers was again best on the stage finishing P6, just 6m12s behind Al-Rajhi the stage winner. Just 3 minutes further back, Brian Baragwanth finished another stage in the top 10 on the day. And just another 2 minutes later saw variawa finish the stage in P13.
The results push all three teams up one position on the General Classification, with just 2 more stages to go to Jeddah.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 10:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | +1 | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 41:16:34 | +03:43:28 |
| 23 | +1 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 45:37:07 | +08:04:01 |
| 34 | +1 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 49:57:11 | +12:24:05 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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Highlights of todays’ Stage 11 in the Cars:
Al-Ula > Yanbu: 464 km Special / 598 km Total
Today was one of the longer stages of the rally at 464 km of timed special stage. More punctures for Giniel - he’s up to 26 for the rally this year - which slowed him a little. P7 on the stage for de Villiers.
Also a significantly slower stage today for the Baragwanath CR6 - they lost over 15 minutes in the 30-odd kilometers between the final waypoint and the end of the stage. Not sure why yet. P26 on the stage today.
Shameer Variawa was solid as a rock again today and finished another stage in the top 20 - P18 for the day.
All round, not much movement on the Overall Standings as we go into the final stage to Jeddah tomorrow.
SA Dakar Competitors after Stage 11:
| Pos | Change | Driver Co-Driver |
Vehicle | Total Time | Diff to Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | = | Giniel de Villiers Alex Haro Bravo |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 46:04:28 | +03:55:02 |
| 21 | +2 | Shameer Variawa Dennis Murphy |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux | 50:36:01 | +08:26:35 |
| 33 | +1 | Brain Baragwanath Taye Perry |
Century Racing CR6 | 55:04:11 | +12:54:45 |
| DNF | — | Henk Lategan Brett Cummings |
Toyota Gazoo Racing Hilux |
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Today sees the last stage of the 2021 Dakar. The top 4 in the cars are seperated by a mere 3 minutes and 35 seconds, so a top 5 mix up is still very possible today. I’ll be holding thumbs for Nasser, who is currently in the lead in a South African Toyota.
Geniel starts the day 6th overall about 4 minutes the Depres in 5th. That means a move to 5th is still possible, but he’ll have to push like a madman!
Shamir Variawa is 16th right now, with only 49 seconds to make up a place. The way he’s been running in the last few stages, he might well see a move up.
Brian Baragwanath is the last South African, starting 25th this morning, only has one second to make up to get to 24th, and only 3 seconds to 23rd! The race is still on in the Century car!
This year’s Dakar certainly held extra drama and excitement. It’s been one for the books, and I’m gonna lie if I said I wasn’t sad that it’s nearing its end.
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Sad news. Dakar is tough, especially for motorcyclists. Doubly so for the Moto Malle/Original by Motul riders.
RIP Pierre.
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