Iveco climbs to the Podium in Stage 3 of the 2015 Dakar

San Juan – Chilecito turned out quite a tough special stage for Trucks, causing trouble to several contenders. The best Iveco man was Gerard de Rooy at the wheel of his Powerstar, who finished third.

​Reliability is just as or even more important than speed in a Dakar competition. In the toughest world’s Rally, competitors are already driving through the tough roads of the Andes Mountains.

Despite having had a good start-off fighting with Eduard Nikolaev’s Kamaz inch by inch, Gerard de Rooy lost some ground in the second half of the stage with his Iveco Powerstar to finish 3rd, 4m30s behind the Kamaz trucks of Russian pilots Mardeev and Karginov: he is behind by less than 10 minutes, so he still stands good chances to continue fighting for victory.

Hans Stacey stayed behind a bit finishing 12m47s away from the leader. Having lost such time, he moved from the 2nd position in the General Classification down to the 8th, behind his team mate Gerard de Rooy.

In turn, Catalonian pilot Pep Vila, onboard the Iveco Trakker Evolution II, remained very close to the Top 10 throughout today’s race. After more than 3h40m, he finished in the 11th position.