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Price frustrated by costly navigation errors

Defending Dakar champion Toby Price has rued the navigation troubles that cost him a big chunk of time during the 2017 race's third stage.

KTM rider Price had headed the field by three minutes prior to Wednesday's Tucuman - Jujuy test, which shook up the order and dropped the Aussie to 16 minutes of new leader Joan Barreda (Honda).

And the vast majority of that deficit was built in the opening kilometres of the timed stage, where Price was among several riders to lose their bearings.

"We knew it was going to be a hard one today and, yeah, we just didn't quite get through the first part of it," said Price. "That was where it was really tricky.

"The traces that were there, the marks, started swinging a little bit left - and it was a smoother line, so I probably had a bit of a mind blank, started drifting that way a little bit. Found myself a little bit too far left of the waypoint and that's where the day starts going wrong."

Price's KTM factory teammates Sam Sunderland and Mathias Walkner likewise ran into issues with navigation, losing 12 and 26 minutes respectively to Barreda.

Said Sunderland: "We knew the first 45km were going to be tricky - but they were really tricky.

"There was a lot of vegetation, crossing through rivers and trying to find the piste again was really tough. We lost probably 10-15 minutes in the first 45km, which was a bit frustrating."

Walkner, who followed Price through the stage, added: "I think everybody got lost two or three times, because it was very tricky, the navigation. Looks like Barreda managed it - I don't know how he did it, but he did it.

"Sometimes it's so tricky, you see many traces and it's your choice - you go your own line, in the camel grass through the bumps or you try to follow the small track and maybe arrive to the same place."

Early deficit no disaster - Price

Asked by Motorsport.com whether 16 minutes was a sizable gap this early on in the rally, Price said: "For sure, it's a lot of time, but at the end of the day it's not that much. It's only stage three and we've still got a lot more stages to go - we were able to win last year by 40 minutes

"It should be good - but definitely frustrating [to lose time]. That's the hardest bit, knowing that you've made a few mistakes, and once you're out there in the middle of nowhere... it looks easy on a computer screen with people seeing it at home, but when you're there and on the spot, trying to find these waypoints and that, it's a whole different world.

"All in all, look, we're still in one piece, we're able to push on for another day."

Zdroj: motorsport.com