Rally of Morocco – Sébastien Loeb’s explanations after his incident at the Prologue

Sébastien Loeb was cautious in front of our microphone during the technical checks in Marrakech (Morocco), this Saturday, October 5. And rightly so! The Dacia team driver had a mishap right from the Prologue of the Rally du Maroc 2024, hitting a crevasse and breaking a front suspension wishbone.

ALSO READ > Rallye du Maroc, Prologue – Already trouble for Loeb!

The Alsatian driver deciphered the sequence once he had crossed the finish line, almost 23 minutes behind the fastest of the day, Guerlain Chicherit and Alex Winocq (Mini). "It happened in a note (from road book) complicated. We should have stayed more on the right side of the track, but Fabian (Lurquin, his co-pilot) didn't have time to give me all the information (from the road book).

"There were a lot of notes that came together in a short time," he adds, so as not to criticize his Belgian navigator in the slightest. We came to a crevasse, deep but not very wide. I saw it, I slowed down, but we still fell into it.

Finally, Sébastien Loeb believes that he should not have braked so much before this obstacle. "Other cars passed the same place, but because they kept more speed, they passed over this hole without any problem. In fact, I was too careful!"

An excess of zeal which has no impact on the general classification of the Rally of Morocco, because the Prologue only served to determine the starting order for the 1st stage scheduled for Monday. And if Loeb-Lurquin only conceded 23 minutes in this story, it is thanks to the involuntary irruption of Marcus Baumgart on the old Prodrive Hunter.

ALSO READ > Loeb before the start of the Rally of Morocco: "We just have one problem to solve"

« We were lucky that our old teammates from last year, our Brazilian friends, stopped at the same place! They were able to pull us out of there. We had to drive very slowly to finish the course because of our broken suspension arm.

Fortunately, the Prologue does not count towards the race ranking. On the other hand, the starting position (for the 1st step) will be a little different from what we expected. But we will start the rally with the desire to experience better special stages than this Sunday."

The best Dacia this Sunday is the one entrusted to Cristina Gutiérrez and Pablo Moreno, in 6th place (+26 seconds).