Tough day for Team HRC in Abu Dhabi

After the great stage that I won yesterday, I put myself second and got off to a good start from a nice start-position and everything was going really well. I was ahead at kilometre 43 when the bike stopped. It was an electrical problem and I wasn’t able to get it started again. Let’s see what happened and how it can be fixed so that it doesn’t happen again in a more important race.

Everything turned out today as we had predicted that it would: I opened the track and this set me back. Right from the start, with complicated dunes it was a difficult ride with tough navigation. But I made it through to the end problem-free, raising the pace in the final part. It’s a pity for Paulo – really bad luck. But we have to look on the bright side – it’s a really hard, demanding test, and it will help us to face the future.

I had a seventh position start so I started from the rear with all the fast guys up front. I tried to catch up as fast as I could and maybe reach Joan and Paulo. But next thing I know I found Paulo at the bottom of the dune with a problem on the bike and unfortunately we couldn’t do anything to get it started. Other than that the day was good. It was hard to see the top of the dunes with the breeze and the position of the sun. So, I’m glad to have finished, there’s one more day tomorrow and I’m going to push tomorrow.

Technology was against us and Paulo had to stop at the beginning of the stage and couldn’t get the bike started again in the soft dunes. Ricky stopped to help him but even together it was not possible so Paulo had to abandon the stage and lost the chance of getting a good result like Joan had done a few days ago. The only one left now fighting for a position is Ricky doing well and moving up to fifth position overall and he will try and finish tomorrow in a decent way. Now, back to work.