Dakar Rally: Peterhansel's rebuilt car leaves team-mate trailing

Stephane Peterhansel continued his dominance of the Dakar Rally by winning the 12th stage in Egypt yesterday. The Frenchman completed the 341km (213 miles) stage around Siwa in 3hr 4min 17sec to increase his advantage at the top of the overall leaderboard to 24 minutes from his Mitsubishi team-mate Hiroshi Masuoka.

The Japanese driver finished second, more than seven minutes slower than Peterhansel, while Jean-Pierre Fontenay moved into third place to give Mitsubishi a clean sweep of the podium places.

"This morning we took off with a rebuilt car," Peterhansel said. "Our pace was, from start to finish, very fast. We hit the car on dune jumps but it paid off. Our position is now a lot more comfortable."

The rally of former Formula One driver Ukyo Katayama ended early when he crashed his Toyota. The former Tyrrell driver emerged unscathed.

Giovani Sala won the bike class by eight seconds from Pal Anders Ullevalseter. Vladimir Tchaguine won the truck category to extend his lead overall to 1hr 6min 52sec from Tomas Tomacek.

Today, the competitors tackle a 569km (355miles) stage from Siwa to Dakhla in Morocco.