YANBU, Saudi Arabia — When a car wins a stage, it should always be seen as a team effort, but today more than ever. Guillaume de Mévius and Mathieu Baumel had already grabbed a stage win together in 2024 en route to second place overall, but their victory in Yanbu tastes even sweeter.
Indeed, there was no guarantee that the crew would ever race together again after the French navigator lost his right leg following an accident.
The prologue winner, Mattias Ekström, and his Ford Raptor held stage 1 in a vice grip for a long time but ended up fourth at the finish, 1′38″ behind the triumphant Mini.
Nasser Al Attiyah slotted in right behind De Mévius, 40 seconds back at the end of the 305 km special. The Czech driver Martin Prokop, who has switched to a Ford Raptor tuned by his own private structure for his eleventh Dakar, rounded out the podium. The former WRC driver, fifth in the 2024 Dakar, appears to have stepped up his game.
Sébastien Loeb eased up a bit after suffering two punctures near the start of stage 1. It ended up costing him three minutes, but he is pleased with his tenth place, which puts him in a prime position to go on the attack on the road to AlUla tomorrow morning.
The defending champion, Yazeed Al Rajhi, will not be as happy after finishing the special almost 29 minutes down on Guillaume de Mévius, including two penalties totalling 16 minutes (one for missing a waypoint and another for speeding).
The young Spaniard Edgar Canet, who claimed the Rally2 title last season, followed up his prologue win in Yanbu with another barnstorming performance in his debut at the top level. The KTM rider bagged stage 1 and tightened his grip on the overall lead.
Ross Branch was the fastest competitor in the 305 km special, but a 6-minute penalty for speeding cost him victory.
The stage podium is a carbon copy of yesterday, but featuring wider margins. Edgar Canet defeated the last two winners of the Dakar, putting 1′02″ into his Red Bull KTM Factory Racing teammate Daniel Sanders and 1′32″ into their Monster Energy Honda HRC rival Ricky Brabec.
The Rally2 special saw the prolific Michael Docherty claim his eleventh win in the class on his KTM, beating the rookie Martim Ventura and his Honda, who had spent most of the stage in the lead but came up short in the final dash to the line, by 1′28″.
