About 327 kilometers into the 2025 Dakar rally, defending champion Carlos Sainz rolled his shiny new Ford Raptor down a dune on stage 2. While he and co-driver Lucas Cruz were able to get righted again, thanks to a yank from Ford teammate Mitch Guthrie, and continue on to the finish of the stage without a windscreen or bodywork of any kind, the damage was done, and the team decided to withdraw from the rest of the 14-day event. The 62-year-old four-time Dakar winner’s race has come to a premature end.
When Sainz reached the bivouac at the close of his Monday struggles, he was already dejected over the time lost on stage. He’d dropped over an hour and a half behind Toyota’s stage winner Rokas Baciuska, what with the roll and stage repairs, plus a puncture and a brief bout of the getting lost.
“The summary is that everything went wrong,” Sainz said, sounding defeated.
“There is still a lot of race left. Obviously, my chances of winning are gone, but as I say, if I can help the team, I can learn and I can try something, so much the better.
“My back hurts a bit, it’s a bit sore, but I don’t think there’s anything out of the ordinary, just the blow.”
Ford was already on the back foot in its debut year running the top class, as Nani Roma, one of the top contenders, suffered an engine failure on day one. To put some icing on that bad luck cake, Sainz’ rollover actually caused a deformation of the car’s roll cage. When his vehicle was taken to FIA officials for inspection to re-enter the event for Tuesday, it was found that his cage had deformed beyond the maximum allowance, and structural damage is not repairable within the event rulebook.
Ford issued a statement about the truck’s withdrawal:
Due to the damage sustained to the safety cage of vehicle #225 [Carlos Sainz and Lucas Cruz] during the accident in the first part of the 48-hour stage of the Dakar Rally 2025 and in accordance with FIA regulations, it has been decided to withdraw the vehicle.
This must be a tough moment for the sexagenarian Spaniard. It’s difficult to know how many more opportunities he has at a Dakar victory before his time in the sands is up.
