The Dakar 2024 will start in Saudi Arabia on January 5 and end in the Kingdom two weeks later. To know everything about the race, here is the complete guide to the 46th edition of the rally run for the first time in 1978.
Who to succeed Nasser Al-Attiyah (cars) and Luciano Benavides (motorcycles) on the Dakar? Winners in 2023, the Qatari driver and the Argentine biker are putting their titles back on the line during the 46th edition of the legendary rally which will be run for the fifth consecutive year on the lands of Saudi Arabia. Entirely contested in the Kingdom, the race will start with a prologue on January 5 and end on January 19 in the town of Yanbu located on the Red Sea.
On the four-wheeled cars, Nasser Al-Attiyah will once again be the big favorite this year. But the five-time winner of the event, between 2011 and 2023, surprised everyone a few weeks ago by announcing his departure from Toyota. The fifty-year-old (53 years old) has decided to leave the Japanese firm with which he was twice world rally-raid champion (2022 and 2023) for Prodrive, the English team financed by Bahrain. With his French co-driver Mathieu Baumel, the Qatari will therefore drive the same car as his runner-up from the previous edition, Sébastien Loeb still in search of his first victory on the Dakar. The Alsatian, nine-time world rally champion, will try his luck once again before joining Dacia in 2025.
The two Prodrive crews will have to watch the competition in their mirrors. First of all, the experienced Stéphane Peterhansel – Mr. Dakar (14 victories in total) – and Carlos Sainz (triple winner), who will still be at the wheel of Audi’s electric buggy (the RS Q e-tron), just like the crew Swedish composed of Mattias Ekström and Emil Bergkvist. At Toyota, winner of the last two editions, the main hopes will rest on the shoulders of local driver Yazeed Al-Rajhi and Argentinian Juan Cruz Yacopini.
As for the bikers, who will suffer during this edition, particularly during this enticing sixth stage run over two days around Shubaytah for a total of nearly 800 kilometers. Riding his Husqvarna, Argentinian Luciano Benavides will face fierce and already well-known competition. The Australian Toby Prince (KTM), winner in 2016 and 2019, and the British Sam Sunderland (GASGAS), winner in 2017 and 2022, are among his best-armed rivals but many others, such as the Chilean Pablo Quintanilla (Honda ), the Australian Daniel Sanders (GASGAS) or the Spaniard Joan Barredo – winner of stages 29 times but never better ranked than fifth at the finish (2017 and 2022) – aspire to add their name to the list of winners of this Dakar 2024. A race which will, for the first time since its creation in 1978, be broadcast largely on the L’Equipe channel (see below).
– Al Attiyah/Baumel (Prodrive Hunter) – n°200
– Al-Rajhi/Gottschalk (Toyota Hilux Overdrive) – n°201
– Peterhansel/Boulanger (Audi RS Q e-tron E2) – n°202
– Loeb/Lurquin (Prodrive Hunter) – n°203
– Sainz/Cruz (Audi RS Q e-tron E2) – no
– Yacopini/Oliveiras (Toyota Hilux Overdrive) – n°205
– Moraes/Monleon (Toyota GR DKR Hilux) – n°206
– Ekström/Bergkvist (Audi RS Q e-tron E2) – n°207
– De Villiers/Murphy (Toyota GR DKR Hilux) – n°209
– Roma/Bravo (Ford Ranger) – n°210
– Chicherit/Winocq (Toyota Hilux Overdrive) – n°211
– Quintero/Zenz (Toyota GR DKR Hilux) – n°216
– From Mévius/Panseri (Toyota Hilux Overdrive) – n°221
– Luciano Benavides (Husqvarna) – n°1
– Toby Price (KTM) – n°2
– Sam Sunderland (GASGAS) – n°4
– Daniel Sanders (GASGAS) – n°5
– Pablo Quintanilla (Honda) – n°7
– Ricky Brabec (Honda) – n°9
– Skyler Howes (Honda) – n°10
– Jose Ignacio Cornejo Florimo (Honda) – n°11
– Romain Dumontier (Husqvarna) – n°16
– Adrien Van Beveren (Honda) – n°42
– Ross Branch (Hero) – n°46
– Kevin Benavides (KTM) – n°47
– Joan Barredo (Hero) – n°88
The ranking will be updated after each stage
The ranking will be updated after each stage
There are changes in 2024. A privileged partner of the rally from the start, France Télévisions will no longer be the main broadcaster of the race this year. Only the Journal du Dakar will be offered each evening to viewers of the public service channel around 8:50 p.m. This 46th edition marks the arrival of the Dakar on the L’Equipe Channel. Broadcast unencrypted on TNT, on channel 21, the channel of the major sports daily will cover the race in detail.
The big live show will allow you to see the arrival of the main competitors each day between 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. with several journalists and consultants on site to collect the participants’ first reactions. It will also be possible to watch the channel’s Dakar Journal from 6:20 p.m. while the summary of each stage will be broadcast at 8 p.m. For those who weren’t able to watch, the highlights of each stage will be rebroadcast each following day from 11am. Note that the Eurosport group, via its channels 1 and 2, will still follow the race, with a summary of around fifty minutes each day at 8 p.m., 11:30 p.m. or the next morning at 8 a.m.
