Nasser Al-Attiyah disagrees with the FIA’s decisions at the Dakar – He thinks a lot of them are not fair and wants to write a letter to the FIA president
Nasser Al-Attiyah is not happy with the decisions of the FIA commissioners at the Dakar Rally. The five-time overall winner also cannot understand why Carlos Sainz (Ford) and Sebastien Loeb (Dacia) are no longer in the race, even though their roll cages were only slightly damaged after accidents.
Al-Attiyah has also been penalized. He has accumulated 16 minutes of penalty time, six of which were for speeding in zones with speed limits. He received ten minutes of penalty time for losing a spare tire during leg five.
Before a leg, the competitors sign a document stating how many tires they started with. This is checked at the end of the leg. Al-Attiyah arrived at the finish of leg 5 with one spare tire less.
A mounting on the Dacia Sandrider was broken. Al-Attiyah and co-driver Edouard Boulanger had not noticed that they had lost the tire. The FIA commissioners imposed the time penalty according to the regulations.
“I don’t understand it,” said an annoyed Al-Attiyah. ”You lose a tire and its mounting, a spectator finds the mounting, but you get a ten-minute penalty. I don’t accept it. But I’m working on solving this problem, because it’s not sporting. It has to be fair.”
“If I do it wrong and lose a tire, okay, then I get ten penalty minutes. But we weren’t aware of that. We have to be fair. I will write a letter to the FIA president to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
The highlights of the sixth stage from Ha’Il to Ad-Dawadimi. More rally videos
On the rest day in Ha’il, FIA President Mohammed bin Sulayem visited the bivouac. He also met with Al-Attiyah at the Dacia tent. It is not known whether there was a discussion behind the scenes.
When asked whether the FIA is killing the race with its decisions, Al-Attiyah replies: “Killing… they are not killing the race. The problem is that the rules are not clear. I want to race against everyone. Against Carlos, Sebastien, Laia.”
“Why is Carlos not here? There is no reason for that. The team can repair the damage. Then why are they [the FIA] saying that it is over? We are not in Formula 1 here. We are in cross-country.”
“How many cars would you find damage in if you checked them carefully?” Al-Attiyah asks. FIA Cross-Country Director Jerome Roussel has already clarified his view of the situation and responded to criticism.