Under torrential rain, the team carries out inspections and servicing at the bivouac in preparation for the marathon stage.

January 5: On this day again, the SS between Termas de Río Hondo and San Salvador Jujuy―which was originally scheduled to be 314km long―was shortened to 190km due to inclement weather. However, the course was blocked due to an accident in the Cars category which was racing ahead of the trucks, and organizers were forced to cut short the Trucks category's SS at CP3 (check point 3). HINO TEAM SUGAWARA's Car 2 piloted by Teruhito Sugawara and Hiroyuki Sugiura delivered a stellar performance, finishing at 15th overall in the Trucks category and top in the Under 10-litre Class. Car 1 also finished in good form at 48th overall and 4th in its class.

The day's SS was similar to yesterday's and primarily consisted of winding gravel roads along the foothills. Road surfaces in some areas were extremely slippery due to rain. This day again, HINO TEAM SUGAWARA's two HINO500 Series trucks delivered excellent performance. Car 2 finished at 20th place overall, and was bumped up to 15th place for the SS after accounting for all penalties accrued over the previous days. Car 1 finished at 49th and was similarly bumped up to 48th place.

After the SS, both HINO500 Series trucks traveled a 302km liaison segment to reach the bivouac in Jujuy near the Argentine-Bolivian border. At the bivouac, both trucks underwent extensive inspections and servicing in preparation for the marathon stages that will be starting on January 6. The trucks will compete on a loop course starting out of Jujuy on January 6, and when they arrive at the bivouac at the end of the day, they will be moved to a storage area where no servicing work will be allowed. For this reason, the team has decided to replace all parts that require periodic replacement ahead of time. As drenched as they were from the thundershower that began late in the afternoon, Hino team mechanics were seen coolly carrying out their jobs.

Yoshimasa Sugawara: The road surfaces were muddy and there were a lot of slippery areas. So I drove very cautiously. The rain came down so hard on the last liaison that it was difficult to see where we were going at times. I'm relieved that we were able to finish without any incident.

Mitsugu Takahashi: We were told that the course was blocked at some point past CP3 and organizers decided to cut the competition short for the Trucks category at CP3. In the end, what was originally scheduled to be a 314km SS was cut down to a mere 130km.

Teruhito Sugawara: Today's stage was similar to yesterday's. Today again, I was impressed with the improvement of our truck's performance that came from the engine's greater torque. We will be climbing up to elevations in the 4000m range tomorrow, but we will be fine as we have driven in that area every year.

Hiroyuki Sugiura: Navigation itself was not that difficult today, but the speed limit signs posted at villages that we had to drive through were complicated and made things quite difficult. We had to be very cautious as we could have been penalized for simply being wrong with our timing.