Rabat - Moroccan Rachid El Morabity, winner of the Marathon des Sables in 2011 and 2014, won the second stage of the 30th edition of the Marathon des Sables, on Monday between Oued Tijekht and Jebel El Otfal in Errachidia province.
He finished the race in 2h 32min 23sec and outpaced his teammate Abdelkader El Mouaziz (2h 35min 18sec) by nearly three minutes and Jordanian Salameh Al Aqra (2h 37min 05sec).
“I am very happy to have been able to open up my lead, especially in relation to Salameh. Today’s stage was very tough, but I tried to manage my race well as far as CP2 before upping the pace,” El Morabity said as quoted by the official website of the marathon.
“Rachid is lighter and got up to the summit quicker than us”, said Abdelkader El Mouaziz before admitting that he, too, was “very satisfied” with this second day.
Rachid El Morabity finished the first stage of 36.2 km kilometres in 2 hours 52min 50sec, followed by his fellow athlete Abdelkader El Mouaziz (2h 53min 05sec) and the Jordanian Salameh El Aqrah (2h 55min 58sec) comes in the third place.
Among women, Swedish Elisabet Barnes, victorious in yesterday’s leg, once again finished a few seconds ahead of American Elizabeth Howard.
Dubbed the toughest footrace on Earth, the second stage set off on Tuesday at 08:30 GMT between the Zireg jebel some 36.7km away.
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