Frenchman David Casteu won the opening stage at Dakar on a 450cc.

Behind the handlebars of a brand new 450cc, Frenchman David Casteu has thrown the proverbial cat amongst the pigeons on the first stage of the Dakar, taking the lead in the general standings with the day’s best time in front of the two favourites for outright victory, Cyril Despres and Marc Coma.

Casteu is someone always full of surprises; like setting up his own team with French constructor Sherco, grabbing the opportunity thrown up by the switch over to 450cc for all the competitors in the bike race in the near future. Casteu, who finished second in the Dakar in 2007 and fourth in 2009, has chosen to challenge his rivals on a newly designed and less powerful bike. The road is still long, but this bold decision has already been rewarded on the first special stage of the 2010 edition, in which the rider from Nice scored the day’s best time, 3″ ahead of Cyril Despres, and 12” in front of title holder Marc Coma. The gaps are small in light of what still awaits them, but this stage win is symbolically significant for brave David.

In the early hours of the morning, a final conversation between Casteu and his mechanic convinced him to try and make an impact between Colon and Cordoba. Over the 168 kilometres remaining to be covered once the stage had been shortened due to flooding at the start of the special, the eternal outsider was true to his sole guiding principle: “Attack, attack, attack”. In the end, Casteu won the second special stage of his career on the Dakar, with the satisfaction of handing out a first defeat to the KTM 690cc riders.

In the series of confrontations between big and small that are on the menu, David Frétigné, on his Yamaha 450cc, was more discrete than Casteu, finishing in 6th position in the day’s standings, almost three minutes off the lead. For the return of Aprilia to the Dakar, Francisco Lopez, also riding a 450cc, took fifth place, 2’42” behind Casteu, but also nearly a minute behind Jordi Viladoms, who finished in fourth.