No excuses will do for Laia Sanz. Accustomed as she is to knocks and having to withstand any physical demand facing her, Laia was able to overcome yesterday’s fall and win through another really tough day. She started the day with her right hand very swollen and painful, but when she got going in the special she forgot the pain and rode hard for the finishing line, which she crossed in 58th place, in other words 28 places up on yesterday. She also improved her classification in the general and is now 55th.

The Spanish rider was not quite sure about everything yesterday: “I was a bit shaken because my hand was really painful and I thought I might have broken something. I went to see the doctors and they told me, after several tests, that there was no serious damage”, she said with relief.

“Once I was on the track, I had less pain than I expected and I was riding pretty well. Hitting the gas was no problem, but leaning on the hand and holding the handlebars in the potholed parts was when it hurt a bit”.

For Laia, it was an advantage that the timed section was cut by 80 kilometres because of heavy rain which had damaged the track too much: “We began the day with good news, because with the special being shortened it was a bit less demanding, although it also must be said that today’s stage was very complicated, with many dangerous points not marked in the road book. This was another of those days when anything can happen. Also, the navigation was very complicated, but I think Marc and I dealt with the difficulties very well”.

Marc Guasch, who crossed the finishing line of the fifth stage in 56th place and is now 57th in the general, said he was satisfied with the day’s work: “Today there were places with very churned up sand where you could sink in, hit the gas and still not move forward. The heat was terrible there and some bikes had cooling problems. We even saw one rider’s bike on fire. The stage was shorter than normal, but it felt as though we had done twice the distance. For our own part, Gas Gas is still functioning in top form and we are working very well as a team. Laia and I keep tabs on each other to keep going without problems, so we are quite content”.