The Bahrain Raid Xtreme Team press release makes no mention of being towed back.
Sebstian Loeb said after stage 8: ““It was a difficult day for us unfortunately and not the result we expected after such a strong start this morning making up some time. We were pushing hard all the stage with a good rhythm but on one way point we struggled to find it and lost around ten minutes so that was very frustrating. We’ve lost six minutes overall to the lead so it is not what we wanted, but it is like this. It’s the Dakar. We will push the max tomorrow and try again.”
It has been confirmed that Sebastian Loeb ran out of fuel after completing stage 8.
