The 2022 Hattah Desert Race was held over July 1 to July 3, and it was GasGas Factory Racing gun Daniel Sanders who dominated the Senior event in fine style.
Sanders set the second-fastest time aboard his GasGas MC 450F in Saturday’s Senior Prologue, before finishing first in the Top 10 Shootout.
The 27-year-old then continued the winning theme on the Sunday, starting from P1 before putting in a scorching eight 37km laps in the Hattah Desert Race to finish with a winning time of 4h 07m 43.388sec.
The effort put him 2m 31.980sec clear of his nearest rival, Todd Waters (Husqvarna), with Jack Simpson (Husqvarna) just over three minutes adrift.
A total of 356 riders finished the Senior event in the 2022 Hattah Desert Race, with a further 44 posting DNFs.
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“It was a mad rush to get to the start line at Hattah this year, but I had a lot of people behind me, helping me out with a lot of support from GasGas Australia, Red Bull and a few other good companies,” said Sanders.
“I grabbed my old mechanic Lewie [Landrigan] from MotoLab, who came and helped me out, so we had a good core group of people around me. We went into the Prologue with a pretty fast bike and just had a good run, passed a few lappers, finished second in that, then got the victory in the Top 10 Shootout by half a second.
“It was good to take off on Sunday and have fresh air; I was able to put in a good first lap and save a lot of energy, and also the second lap, then the guys were pushing the pace, riding really well in the third, fourth lap, and sort of dropped off a bit halfway through.
“I kept cruising along, diesel training, and got the victory in the end and was able to claw the gap out to two and a half minutes, which was good!”
1. Daniel Sanders (GASGAS) 4h 07m 43.388sec
2. Todd Waters (Husqvarna) 4h 10m 15.368sec
3. Jack Simpson (Husqvarna) 4h 13m 35.332sec
4. Andrew Wilksch (Husqvarna) 4h 18m 42.073sec
5. Lachlan Terry (KTM) 4h 20m 17.011sec
6. Korey McMahon (GASGAS) 4h 26m 57.144sec