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Spaniard Carlos Sainz (VW) kicked off proceedings at 09.16 as scheduled for the last special in the car category and the final duel for outright victory with Stephane Peterhansel (Mitsubishi), who set off 2 minutes later. They were followed by American Robby Gordon (Hummer), Germany's Dieter Depping (VW) and Frenchman Luc Alphand (Mitsubishi). Depping and Alphand are battling it out for the third place on the final podium.

American Robby Gordon (Hummer) encountered problems with one of his wheels after 45 km of the special, but has repaired it and rejoined the race.

Having won the final stage with a lead of 1'43” over Stephane Peterhansel (Mitsubishi), as a result Spaniard Carlos Sainz has won the first Central Europe Rally, the inaugural event in the Dakar Series, 2'01” in front of the Frenchman in the general standings.

Carlos Sainz : Winner - “This race was extremely difficult for us, especially after we lost a lot of time on the first two stages. After that, we were at 100% for the rest of the race and everything turned out fine. Today, Stephane made a small mistake, but we really attacked from start to finish. Mitsubishi worked well and pushed us all the way in this rally, even if in the end we were the best. In any case, this race was nothing like a normal rally-raid event, but not like the WRC either.

It's much more like a Baja, but much, much longer and therefore much more difficult. It was really hard, but I'm here to race a rally-raid whatever the state of the terrain, even if we have to go into the desert, I'll go, if we have to go to Argentina, I'll go, if we have to race in Central Europe I'll go. You have to be flexible to race in rally-raids!”

Stéphane Peterhansel : 2nd in car category - “I think I was too focused today! I was too obsessed by the idea that today was the same special as yesterday but that it had to be driven in 100% attack mode. I remembered that we went through the forest at one time yesterday before heading back onto the main track, so I went into the forest, even with the instructions from my co-pilot who was telling me to go straight ahead. I realised almost instantly that it was a mistake, but it was too late! I ended up doing a small extra loop for nothing which cost me between 45 seconds and 1 minute, and from that moment on, I decided it was better to make sure of 2nd place!