The World Cross Country Championships were launched in 2022, when after an initiative by the organization of the rally Dakarsought alliance with the mother entities of each of the disciplines. It was there when the International Automobile Federation (FIA) and the International Motorcycling Federation (FIM) joined forces to put a complex activity on track, since everything is mixed in the most extreme adventure in the world of motorsport.
Under the W2RC regime, or the World Cross Rally Rally, which each year has the Dakar as the special and inaugural date of each year, the great race left the power to enforce the regulations in the hands of the large supervisory bodies. From sports to technical.
The task was not easy. As each category had its particularities, in addition to certain customs that the organization had ingrained in and carried over from other times, the task was gigantic. Little by little, the situation normalized and with the consensus of leaders, teams and drivers, The Dakar went through the transition period without major difficulties.
In each camp, the task is well distributed. The leaders of the ASO (Amaury Sport Organization), the company that manages the Dakar, focus on the organization of the event, in every sense, while the FIA and the FIM work to control each of the disciplines.
This first week of Dakar 2025 in Saudi Arabia has not yet ended and the great figures of the competition were out of the raceby decision of the supervisory body. In short, the great idols were marginalized by determinations of the FIA, and the Dakar was left without its great stars in just a handful of days.
The most resonant case of the last hours was that of Carlos Sainzwho had just won the previous Dakar with Audi and was now presented with the ostentatious Ford Performance project. After a spectacular blow, the FIA eliminated Sainz from the competition.
“Due to the damage to the safety cage of vehicle #225 (Carlos Sainz and Lucas Cruz) derived from the accident in the first part of the 48 Hours of Dakar 2025, in consideration of FIA regulations it has been decided to withdraw the vehicle. ”Ford reported in the statement.
Sainz had suffered an accident during the second stageat the beginning of the “48 Hours Chrono”, but upon arriving at the Bisha camp, the sports authorities detected that the Raptor’s safety structure had suffered problems after the impact.
Although the vehicle responded mechanically, despite having arrived at the camp without a body and windshield, Lucas Cruz himself, Sainz’s navigator, expressed that the chassis was affected by the impact.
A few hours before, the also Spanish Laia Sanz She left a precedent that was difficult to avoid: due to a deformation of just two millimeters in the anti-roll bar, she said goodbye to the Dakar without completing even a stage.
Immediately after; another of the great figures, went through a similar situation. The French Sebastien Loebformer world rally champion, starred in a spectacular rollover with the Dacia.
After the objections, helped by his companion, the Spanish Cristina Gutiérrez, he returned to the march and arrived at the camp. But there, the FIA, with the implacable sentence that executed the other two, sentenced Loeb to abandon.
“The representatives of the competitor have recognized that there is damage to the safety arch, although they do not consider that this damage will affect safety and they assured that the level of safety after the accident did not change compared to before it”indicated the FIA statement, which also highlighted that “it is not safe to allow the competitor to continue the event.”
Loeb’s Dacia suffered hits to the front right side anti-roll bar, the co-pilot’s, as happened to Sainz and Cruz.
“I hit an edge and we bounced to the other side and the car overturned. The tires of two wheels flew, but we were only stopped for 5 minutes. We didn’t suffer much damage, but after about 50 km, a steering tie rod broke. And although it was nothing serious, it turns out that the spare part had remained inside the bodywork at the site of the rollover.”he pointed out. Cristina Gutiérrez arrived there to give him that piece. But things were worse.
Photo: REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov“Cristina stopped to give us one, but then the front fan broke down, so we drove at the pace of the light vehicles throughout the stage. It hasn’t been our day. “It’s bullshit!” Loeb protested.
While in the Dakar camp some maintain that the heavy hand of the FIA is detrimental to the spirit of the Dakar, the highest echelons of the competition agree with the criteria determined by the regulatory body.
And in fact, those who are accustomed to the parameters of the FIA, support their procedure with the facts, since while the Dacia team intended to present an appeal to the measure, Loeb himself would have seemed distant and in the refusal to support the measure. defense of his team.
The rules are to be followed. And more so the security ones. In this, the FIA is relentless, in all categories, and also manifests it in the Dakar.
Nicolás Cavigliasso won another stage again and leads the Dakar
Nicolás Cavigliasso from Cordoba, navigated by his wife Valentina Pertegarini, won the Challenger category in the 4th stage of the Dakar 2025 rally in Saudi Arabia.
The Cordoban, who achieved his third partial victory, won the stage that begins the Marathon, which implies that tonight all the pilots will spend the night in an exclusive camp for them, without contact with the teams nor can they receive assistance of any kind.
In this way, Cavigliasso increases his lead in the general classification to more than 25 minutes over the second, the American Corbin Leverton.
In Ultimate, the most powerful discipline among cars, the Mendoza Juan Cruz Yacopini He was third and is eighth in the general classification, led by South African Henk Lategan, the Cuyo’s Toyota teammate.
On motorcycles, Luciano Benavídes He is the best national representative, with 8th place overall. your brother Kevintwo-time winner of the Dakar, is 29th, and the Neuquén Santiago Rostan it’s 48°.
On Thursday, the fifth stage, between Alula and Ha’il, north of Saudi Arabia, with a total route of 491 kilometers, of which 428 will be special tests.