Sand, sweat and tears: this is what awaits the adventurers who dare to take on the Dakar 2025. The main outlines of the 47th edition of the rally-raid were presented by David Castera during a day Dakar Tour initiation in Les Comes, near Barcelona (Spain). Here’s what you need to remember.
Dates, countries and places of departure/arrival: we stay in Saudi Arabia
The Dakar 2025 will begin on January 3 and end on January 17 after two weeks of effort. As has been the case since 2020, the entire event will take place exclusively in Saudi Arabia. However, the starting point changes. Technical and administrative checks will take place in the south of the country, in Bisha, and no longer in the north. The race has never started this far south of Saudi Arabia.
48H Chrono back to the Dakar 2025
The double stage launched in 2024 by Amaury Sport Organization (ASO), which consisted of sleeping under the stars in the heart of the dunes, without knowing your position in the ranking, before getting back behind the wheel the next day “blindly”, pleased. So, she will return, from the first days of racing in 2025!
This 48 hour chrono will use the same ingredients… but longer. While the 2024 version was spread over 540 km in two days, the vehicles will have to tackle 950 km in 2025. In return, the route will be more varied, alternating between technical and rolling. The challenge will present itself in the first week, with opportunities to dig gaps, but not only in the dunes.
Empty Quarter: justice of the peace or not?
The Quart-Vide desert (in English, the Empty Quarter) has become in the space of two years an unmissable event on the Dakar. In the largest expanse of dunes in the world, both machines and crews suffer, making it possible to capture breathtaking images. It is in this extraordinary landscape that David Castera wanted to set up the final stages as well as the final finish of the Dakar 2025.
Three stages emphasizing navigation are planned there, including a stage of more than 400 terminals. For the last stage, the stretches of sand will share the spotlight with the cars and motorcycles, which will start in a line, like what TSO (the previous organizer of the Dakar in the 1980s and early 1990s) had as a custom to organize in the African desert.
The position of the Empty Quarter at the very end of the effort could at first glance suggest that the course of the first week and a half would be made easier in order to spare the competitors and the suspense for the final victory. But this desert positioned on the home stretch is no guarantee of an upheaval in the rankings: in 2023, almost nothing happened in the fight for the top 10, because Nasser Al-Attiyah had dug far too many holes. advances on Sébastien Loeb only to be caught.
Above all, the Dakar 2025 will not fail to be tough well before entering Shubaytah, because in addition to the 48H Chrono, a marathon stage will be set in the middle of the route. Managing the mechanics over more than 800 km will be essential here for those who intend to play the leading roles because any external assistance will be prohibited in the bivouac.
Separate cars and motorcycles: what are the consequences?
This is unheard of in the modern era of the Dakar. On “at least” 5 stages of the Dakar 2025, the Car and Motorcycle specials will be separated. The primary reason is to improve the safety of motorcyclists, who are overtaken by 4x4s and SSVs during the day and who have to push themselves to let them pass, most often in the dust.
The benefit of this modification of the regulations concerns the tactics which will be taken into account by the contenders for victory in Auto. On at least five occasions in 2025, the best car crews will have to follow the track in the desert, without benefiting from the clues left by two-wheelers.
Those involved: Loeb for revenge
As for the entrants, it is still far too premature to accurately list all the crews who will spend the month of January in the sand. However, we know that three manufacturers will be officially represented: Toyota, Ford and Dacia. The Hilux T1+ 4×4 has been one of the essentials of the Dakar for a long time and will continue to be so thanks to the Belgian trainer Overdrive. Toyota Gazoo Racing has placed its trust in a new generation of drivers in 2024 (Seth Quintero, Lucas Moraes) and we do not see why this would no longer be the case in 2025.
Dacia is actively preparing its entry into the Dakar with a technical association established with the English company Prodrive. The crews as well as the car, the Sandrider, were presented last winter, and it promises to be tough: Sébastien Loeb-Fabian Lurquin, Nasser Al-Attiyah-Édouard Boulanger and Cristina Gutiérrez-Pablo Moreno. The Alsatian will finally want to win a Dakar which refuses to him despite several podiums between 2017 and 2024.
Finally, Ford is also developing a new 4×4 with T1+ standards for 2025, with two 100% Spanish crews, including the outgoing winners Carlos Sainz-Lucas Cruz. The Madrid veterans will be supported by Nani Roma and Alex Haro. Waiting for other announcements.
READ ALSO > Here is the Dacia Sandrider, Sébastien Loeb’s weapon for the 2025 Dakar
