Red Bull KTM factory rider and 2016 Dakar Rally champion Toby Price of Australia launched his bid for the win in the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge on Sunday with a win in the opening stage of five in the challenging Liwa Desert.

Price also took the victory in Saturday’s prologue, an 8km high-speed dash of just under two minutes that decided the starting order for the first stage. On Sunday he finished in 3h37m47s, but factory teammate Sam Sunderland was only 35 seconds behind. Third place in the stage, and in the standings, went to Pablo Quintanilla, only one minute behind the leader.

“Yesterday we took the win in the prologue and today Sam and Pablo [Quintanilla] and I pretty much raced neck and neck and we all took a turn at the front,” Price said. “It was a good day but this is my first time here in Abu Dhabi and it’s a new learning curve for me.

“It gets difficult around midday when the sun is high and that makes everything very difficult to see but it was a good day and I like racing in the desert. There are another four stages and I know I have to ride smooth and not do anything silly.”

The stage heralded a return to elite competition for Sunderland, who finished second here last year and was also second overall behind factory teammate Matthias Walkner in the 2015 world championship.

The British rider was denied a chance to compete in the 2016 Dakar when he broke his femur in the Merzouga Rally while preparing for the season’s most important event. Walkner is meanwhile also working on his rehabilitation after an injury that cut short his own Dakar bid in 2016.

The Desert Challenge is the first round of the FIM Cross-Country Rallies World Championship 2016. The second stage on Monday will be over 510.65km, with 278.9km of timed special. The rally concludes on Thursday.