Honda dominate Dakar Stage Four led by Cornejo

2024 Dakar Rally – Stage Four
Al Salamiya > Al-Hofuf

Stage Four saw riders battle from the bivouacs in Al Salamiya towards the city of Al Hofuf. The total distance covered for the day was 700 km, with just 299 kilometres of those making up the timed special.

Nacho Cornejo put his navigator skills to good use to take the stage win by almost three-minutes. By contrast, standings leader Ross Branch had a number of crashes, dropping him down the stage results and allowing Cornejo to take the overall lead of the Rally.

José Ignacio “Nacho” Cornejo – P1

“It was a good stage, it was a mix of terrains and they did say it would be a little bit easier. It felt faster and not as physical as the previous days, but there were some sections of tricky navigation so I had to stay focused. I did some little mistakes at the beginning but then I pushed harder with a good solid pace and finished in a positive way. Tomorrow we start with the dunes so let’s see how it goes.”

It was a tough day for the Aussies. Toby Price losing time due to a navigation error and ultimately completing the stage in 15th place, while Daniel Sanders had to settle for 20th after struggling to balance pace with keeping an eye on his logbook.

Toby Price – P15

“Not the best day for me – with so many tracks ahead of us in the sand and some tough navigation on the stage, we got lost a little midway through and ended up losing some time. It’s still very early days with a long way to go, but it’s always frustrating to have a rough day. There were a lot of spectators out there on the special, which is always good to see. Overall though, I’m happy to be here at the finish in one piece and still well in the race, so we’ll focus on tomorrow and see what that brings.”

Daniel Sanders – P20

“A bit of a rough one today and I struggled a lot with my riding. It was pretty tricky to ride with a good pace while keeping an eye on the roadbook and those two things aren’t really coming together for me at the moment. Not my best day at the Dakar, but we’ll be back again tomorrow to fight another day.”

Back at the forefront and making sure to rest up with an early night in his tent, a re-invigorated Ricky Brabec made it a one-two on the podium for the Monster Energy Honda Team as he accumulated a minute in bonuses on the shorter 299 km special stage.  It was a great result for the American rider as he opened the way with Kevin Benavides on what turned out to be a day with very tricky navigation.

Ricky Brabec – P2

“Stage four was good, it was the shortest one yet so I was happy to have a shorter day. We’re at the bivouac an hour earlier than we have been, so that’s also nice and it gives the mechanics some more time to work on the bikes. I was second on the road which definitely wasn’t easy as navigation is really tricky this year. It can catch you off guard quickly so if you’re not on your toes from sunrise to sunset then it really can throw you. Tomorrow’s stage five is a sand dune day, it’s a short one but it’ll be long day in the saddle with the liaison. It’s going to be an interesting next three days, everyone in the team is doing a great job and I’m looking forward to getting to the end of this rally.”

Red Bull KTM Factory Racing’s Kevin Benavides has put in an excellent performance to complete the stage in third place, opening the timed special following his stage three win, the KTM 450 RALLY racer navigated perfectly from the front to finish just over three minutes behind the eventual winner.

Kevin Benavides – P3

“It’s been a good day for me today. I really enjoyed opening, and I think I did a good job and didn’t lose too much time to the guys behind. The stage was really fast – a lot different to the previous few stages – and there was still quite a lot of tricky navigation, so I had to really focus on my roadbook. At the refueling, I noticed I had a big cut on my rear tire, which was worrying, so from there to the finish I tried to take as much care as I could. Tomorrow, we have a shorter special, but a lot of liaison with a really early start, so I’ll get some rest now and hopefully carry today’s speed into stage five.”

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Ross Branch’s two crashes were both fortunately not serious and the man from Botswana lost the three-minute lead he had yesterday and even gave away an extra one to take fourth for the stage.

Adrien Van Beveren has himself dialled in with a fifth place result, making it three Monster Energy Honda Team riders in the top five, and with dunes coming up tomorrow in the hostile Empty Quarter, the three-time Le Touquet beach race king will be on the hunt for his first stage victory this year on his favourite terrain, aiming to rise up the overall standings from his current fifth position.

Adrien Van Beveren – P5

“We’ve had two good days, I feel really good on the bike and the rhythm is good now. I feel happy as I’m enjoying my riding, although today it was bit more stony so I enjoyed it a little bit less than yesterday. We had some dunes at the end which was fun and there are more to come tomorrow. The goal was to get back on the overall classification and I’m now fifth and not far off the front, so everything is possible to get back that time.”

Luciano Benavides has delivered a strong performance, completing the second leg of the marathon without issue in sixth place, to improve his overall ranking.

Luciano Benavides – P6

“I felt a lot better on the bike today for stage four. It was a shorter stage, but there were some rocky pistes which made it tough, and I had to really focus to make sure I didn’t make any mistakes. Overall, I’m happy with my results so far and I’m looking forward to the next few days of racing through the dunes.”

Joan Barreda then finished seventh, despite a one-minute penalty as the second Hero Motorsports rider in the top-10, with Rui Goncalves eighth as the top Sherco.

Rui Gonçalves – P8

“Today’s stage was a little shorter than the others but included a lot of liaison. The course was faster, and we had more sand. We once again had to be very vigilant when navigating because we could very quickly make a mistake, stray from the course, and make a mistake. Many riders paid the price and lost time and position. I managed to stay focused and avoid all the pitfalls. I finished the stage in the top 10, 8th to be precise, and that gives me confidence for the days to come. I am very happy with this result, for me and for all the members of the team who do a huge amount of work every day so that we can ride in the best conditions! I would like to thank all our sponsors, the entire team and my fans for their support and encouragement.”

Skyler Howes has been enjoying the rocky stages so far, although he did struggle to find a hidden waypoint today, finishing ninth as a result, Romain Dumontier rounding out the top-10 behind him.

Skyler Howes – P9

“I’m becoming more and more confident with the bike, we’ve made a few little changes to the suspension and to some other positive adjustments. I had a small mechanical issue which slowed me down and I also had to search for a hidden waypoint which lost me some time. The pace and riding was good and it was overall another positive day. I do prefer the previous stages as there’s more stones, rocky canyons and technical navigation, once you get into the dunes it’s almost like a motocross race, you push really hard and you just follow the compass.”

Pablo Quintanilla had a stage to forget as 100 km in to the day’s action a parked up truck created some confusion on the route. What he thought was a navigational error was actually the correct way and this lost him over eighteen minutes to Cornejo, finishing the stage 13th.

Pablo Quintanilla – P13

“Today was a super tough stage for me. We left a river bed and I saw some workers with a big truck parking up which didn’t seem right. I thought that I wasn’t going in the right direction and so I went back to search for the route. Toby (Price) arrived and he was in the same predicament. Finally we went back in the direction of the truck and the correct way was behind it. I got confused because of the workers and the truck so I didn’t think it was possible to go that way. It is what it is, we are still in the race so now we need to be focused again, get rest and go on the attack tomorrow.”

Standings after Stage Four

The Dakar Rally standings now see Cornejo leading,  1m15s clear of Ross Branch with Ricky Brabec almost five-minutes off leading pace.

It’s a more noticeable gap back to Kevin Benavides (+20m39) and Van Beveren (+22m30) in fourth and fifth, followed by Luciano Benavides (+31m11), Quintanilla (+31m44) and our own Toby Price (+34m54).

Daniel Sanders dropped just outside the top-10 to 11th, trailing the lead by 39m43s, but we’re only one-third of the way through the Rally, so there’s plenty of stages left to close that gap.

As the 48 Hour Chrono gets ever closer riders will have to muster up all their energy for stage five tomorrow.  Although it’s only 118 km against the clock in the dunes, a very early start will see them covering a 527 km road section as they head towards the Red Sea and the city of Shubaytah.

2024 Dakar Rally Stage Four Results

2024 Dakar Rally Standings after Stage Four

Dakar Rally 2024 Route Map

2024 Dakar Rally Schedule