Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

It was a long time coming, but Bruno Santos will race the Dakar Rally in 2024.

His debut would have come two years prior in 2022, but he suffered an injury after crashing at the 2021 Rallye du Maroc that forced him to start over from square one. After spending 2022 recovering, he returned to action at the 2023 Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, his first time racing in the World Rally-Raid Championship, and did not miss a step as he finished fifth among Rally2 riders. He was also second in the Road to Dakar class, the winner of which earns free registration to Dakar; although previously accepted for the 2022 Dakar, him skipping meant he had no prior experience in the race and was therefore eligible.

“This year, I finally managed to recover from the injury that suffered in the Morocco Rally in 2021, and I will now be able to compete in the Dakar Rally, a participation that is the culmination of several years of work,” Santos told MotoJornal. “I am very pleased to be able to make this project that has been on my sporting agenda for so long possible.”

Afterwards, he returned to Portugal to race in the FMP Portuguese Cross-Country Championship (CNTT), which he won in 2018 and 2019. He won two rounds, the Baja Portalegre 500 and Baja TT do Oeste, en route to the TT3 category championship. The Baja TT do Oeste is also part of the FIM Bajas World Cup, which also had the Baja Portalegre 500 through 2022.

Santos will race the #140 Husqvarna 450 Rally Replica for Xraids Experience in the Rally2 class. He revealed his programme last weekend as part of a special event callde the Torres Vedras TT, a motorcycle tour in which over 300 riders rode 300 kilometres from Tagus to the Portuguese coast.

After a decade with FOX and NBC carrying the NASCAR Cup Series, the top level of stock car racing will be aired across six different platforms from 2025 to 2031 as part of a lucrative television rights deal worth USD$7.7 billion (7.068 billion euros).

“These agreements not only show NASCAR’s importance to the sports and entertainment ecosystem, but also the willingness of some of the world’s largest and most respected media companies to make significant investments in America’s leading motorsport,” commented Brian Herbst, NASCAR’s Senior Vice President of Media and Productions. “The media landscape is rapidly evolving, with new distribution platforms providing more options to the consumer than ever before. This is the right mix of media partners to promote and deliver content around our sport, positioning NASCAR for growth across different mediums and giving our fans uninterrupted access on the established platforms that they are already using. We are excited to work with this best-in-class group of media companies to deliver the best of NASCAR racing and the excitement of live sports to our fans.”

FOX and NBC will return as the main broadcast partners, though with reduced races on over-the-air TV as they increase focus on their cable networks FS1 and USA. Five races including the season-opening Daytona 500 will be on FOX while the other nine are on FS1, while NBC airs four and USA covers the other ten. Both networks bookend the season, with NBC taking over the final fourteen races including all ten playoff events.

For the midseason portion, Amazon Prime Video and Warner Bros. Discovery‘s TNT Sports get ten races apiece. Amazon Prime Video, which will be NASCAR’s first streaming service partner, already carries various sports such as the NFL’s Thursday Night Football, the ATP Tour, and the Premier League. TNT returns to NASCAR after a decade away, having previously split coverage as part of a package deal with NBC from 2001 to 2014.

Amazon and Max, formerly known as HBO Max, will stream practice and qualifying. The latter will do so via the Bleacher Report Sports Add-On app.

The 2024 Dakar Rally will be missing a pair of Lithuanian ladies as Team North’s Girls and Aistė Perminaitė have separately confirmed they will not take part. Both would have raced in the SSV (formerly T4) category.

North’s Girls is a French-Lithuanian programme consisting of Lithuanians Agnė Telyčėnaitė and Sandra Rimkė. The duo have competed thrice in the Moroccan women-only Rallye Aïcha des Gazelles and are currently focusing on the BP Ultimate 24 Horas TT Vila de Fronteira rally in Portugal.

“Those who really know me know that I have enough anger and determination and stubbornness to complete challenges that are impossible… Lithuanian, female racer, from nowhere, nothing but dreaming of getting stuck in the middle of dunes and grass in the world’s toughest rally raid,” wrote Telyčėnaitė in October. “I’ve never been so close to getting there, I’m preparing and investing in myself, I’m pushing myself and at any cost I’m moving forward by training with the available tools, step by step, head on the wheel, accumulating valuable experience! […]

“Thank you to the people who follow us, near or far, who support us and believe in us.
I need to surround myself again with the best people to support me. The team we have created will be revisited and we will reach our goals even higher. These thoughtful decisions make us wise, and we are committed to winning with you!

“A new beginning: towards DAKAR 2025, new crew, new team, new rewards for our future sponsors! Nothing will stop us! It’s time to prepare for the new season, after the French championship, we can’t wait to share new adventures with you, VERY soon, and the most important thing is to include you in each of them!”

Buggyra Racing‘s truck racing division, Tatra Buggyra ZM Racing, has unveiled their 2024 Dakar Rally challenger that Martin Šoltys will race with Tomáš Šikola and Petr Schweiner by his side in the #605. Known as the Tatra Buggyra Evo3, the truck is the successor to the Tatra 815 that Šoltys piloted to a sixth in class at the 2023 race.

The truck was subject to a tight development schedule in order to comply with new FIA rules. Such a calendar was so narrow that the team could only conduct two days of testing in a quarry, though Šoltys noted “we had no problems at all” save for occasional snags like broken truck lights.

“The building of the truck was significantly delayed due to the FIA regulations issued in the summer,” said team communication head Jan Kalivoda. “The fact that we managed to get the third generation of our Tatra ready for the Dakar and for it to leave in time for embarkation in Barcelona is a small miracle. Two months ago, we were far from being ready. Then started the intense phase of completing all of that year’s work and a year’s preparation.

“We’ve seen that a conventional cabin like this is the way to go for today’s trucks. During the summer, we already tried the new parts in a test with the Tatra 815 and therefore know that the new truck is built solidly with good components. The next step will be the Dakar which will heavily test the functionality and durability of our trucks. We don’t have big ambitions for the Evo3 regarding the result. We are going to get as much experience as we can. The goal is to reach the finish line and collect as much data as possible at every stage.”

Much of the Evo3 is modelled after the Tatra Phoenix, with Soltys estimating about eighty percent overlap between them. Both use the same engine, transmission, and chassis, though differences include new coil spring shocks.

As Team Audi Sport prepares for what is likely their final Dakar Rally in 2024, they have made changes to the Audi RS Q e-tron to ensure a strong swan song. Mattias Ekström, Stéphane Peterhansel, and Carlos Sainz will remain the drivers.

Dubbed the Audi RS Q e-tron E2, the car made its début at the 2022 Rallye du Maroc to much anticipation. Despite showing speed at the 2023 Dakar Rally as Sainz won the opening stage, the team struggled to keep up with Toyota and Prodrive before wrecks ended Peterhansel and Sainz’s races while Ekström finished a distant fourteenth.

Sainz fractured his vertebrae in his crash in Stage #9, as did Peterhansel’s co-driver Édouard Boulanger three legs prior. To minimise the risk of injury, the team redesigned the foam in the seats so that load is more broadly distributed while the car is in motion. The dampers, springs, and bump stop in the chassis have also been adjusted; the crash box at the chassis’ front, which is composed of carbon-fiber-reinforced polymers, has been made longer to better absorb impacts.

The uprights, brake discs, and rim bed in the car’s wheel hubs now have more clearance and protection from rocks that could get inside and penetrate critical components. This resulted in tyre failures, which were a common theme at the 2023 race for other teams as well; supplier BFGoodrich intends to bring a thicker tyre compound to the 2024 race. When Audi convened for their first post-Dakar test session in May, much of its focus was on tyre reliability.

Even with reliability seemingly resolved, the main concern still remains staying competitive against Toyota, Prodrive, and other cars in the premier Ultimate class. Audi races in the T1.U subcategory for upgraded electric cars, while Toyota and Prodrive are among those in the petrol-based T1+. To ensure a level playing field, the FIA has an “Equivalence of Technology” rule that allows them to modify the acceleration of T1.U and T1+ cars mid-race based on how it is playing out; this change proved controversial in January when Audi’s output was increased to 271 kW, which Toyota protested. For 2024, the Audi will run on 286 kW of power.

After racing the 2023 Dakar Rally in a T3 car, Joan Font will return to the SSV (formerly T4) class for the 2024 edition. He will race a Can-Am Maverick X3 for Scuderia Ramilo Rodamoto with Josep Coromina as his co-driver.

“It is a new stage in my career. After many years, my team has changed,” said Font. “Scuderia Ramilo Rodamoto is young but more than prepared to face a challenge like this. We are all working hard on preparations to arrive in the best possible shape at the start of the Dakar.”

Font made his Dakar début in 2017 in an SSV, followed by another start two years later where he finished fortieth overall and fifth in class (he was forced to miss the 2018 race due to a cycling accident). He switched to the T2 (now Stock) category in 2020, scoring third in the class in back-to-back years.

After skipping 2022, he moved into a Can-Am T3 (now Challenger) for FN Speed Team in 2023. He was sixteenth overall in the category with a best daily finish of twelfth in Stage #4.

Prior to entering rally raids, Font competed in rallying that included select starts in the World Rally Championship.

At the 2023 Dakar Rally in January, Wei Han won the T1.2 subcategory while Red-Lined Motorsport topped T1.1. For 2024, the two parties will join forces to tackle the premier T1+ division with the HW2024. Their partnership is a multi-year agreement to develop a T1+ car for the Chinese market.

Wei had been racing the SMG HW2021, which finished eighth overall in the 2023 Rally and first in T1.2 for 4×2 cars. He ran his second and final race of the 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship at the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, placing sixth overall and fifth among points-eligible drivers.

His HanWei Motorsport Team fielded a second HW2021 for Po Tian, who finished thirty-first overall at Dakar (thirteenth for T1.2). He was the only other T1.2 in the Abu Dhabi field but did not finish. The team will continue to race the SMG with Xiangyan Sun, who is making her Dakar début.

“While our older generation two-wheel-drive buggy was a very good racing car, the new FIA regulations and the future of the sport are clearly developed around the new Ultimate T1+ class,” Wei explained. “With this in mind, it was critical that we align ourselves with one of the world’s leading T1+ vehicle manufacturers. As such we are extremely excited to partner up with Red-Lined Motorsport in the Republic of China.

“Eighth overall in the 2023 Dakar may be a hard act for us to follow right now as we begin our development program into the world of big four-wheel drive T1+ race cars. There is however no better way to test and begin this journey than the Dakar Rally.

For the first time since 2011, #60 will appear on a NASCAR Cup Series circuit. On Wednesday, RFK Racing announced the creation of Stage 60, which will field the #60 Ford Mustang part-time for various drivers starting with David Ragan at the Daytona 500. BuildSubmarines.com will sponsor the effort.

Ragan returns to RFK, having previously been a development driver in the 2000s before competing full-time in the Cup Series from 2007 to 2011. He eventually moved to ally Front Row Motorsports, where he spent the second half of his career before stepping away from regular competition after 2019, though he has occasionally returned for superspeedway races with Ford. Despite not racing in 2023, he remains a test driver for Ford to this day.

He is often regarded as one of the top superspeedway racers in the series, with both of his Cup victories coming at Daytona and Talladega along wth eighteen top-ten finishes. His first Xfinity Series win also came at Talladega in 2009.

“It’s really exciting to be back in an RFK Ford,” said Ragan. “I spent some of the best years of my career driving for Mr. Jack (Roush) and the team at RFK. They really gave me my first opportunity in the sport and I have to thank BuildSubmarines.com for helping make this happen. We had a really strong run going in my last year at Roush at the 500, and hopefully we can go back and finish what we started.”

#60 is a number long used by Roush’s Xfinity programme. Its last Cup appearance came in 2011 with Germain Racing running much of the calendar as a start-and-park operation. Roush has only employed #60 once at the Cup level for Matt Kenseth, who failed to qualify for what would have been his Cup début at Talladega in 1998.

The 2024 Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge will span 2,250 kilometres in total length, 1,450 km of which will be timed Selective Sections. It will also feature two bivouacs for the first time, with the main hub being in Al Dhannah while a new one opens in Liwa.

“In close collaboration with our valued strategic partners, our team has been working on enhancing the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge experience for our competitors, teams, media, spectators and sponsors,” said Khalid Ben Sulayem, who oversees the United Arab Emirates’ motorsport federation Emirates Motorsports Organization. “As we prepare to celebrate 33 years of the event’s history, the 2024 edition will feature a revamped format, including further changes to last year’s rally route and the introduction of a second bivouac. While still rooted in the iconic city of Abu Dhabi, these modifications aim to offer competitors a fresh, dynamic and more challenging event.

“We look forward to welcoming you all in Abu Dhabi for yet another epic adventure!”

Held annually since 1991, the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge is the second round of the World Rally-Raid Championship. While the rally predominantly takes place in the Liwa desert, 2024 will be the first time that the bivouac is situated in its confines. The primary bivouac in 2023 was in Qasr Al Sarab, a nearby desert resort, while Al Dhannah hosted the Prologue stage.

At 1,450 km in SS, the race will be longer than 2023’s 1,286 though neither surpass the 2022 edition’s 1,933.

Christine GZ will once again serve as Extreme E‘s female Championship Driver for the 2023 season-ending Copper X Prix, repeating a role she coincidentally held at the 2022 finale. Patrick O’Donovan remains the male reserve driver.

“I am delighted to be back in the Extreme E paddock once again,” said GZ. “It all feels so familiar, like one big family, and I am really excited to get back behind the wheel of the ODYSSEY 21 for the season finale. It is a great championship to be a part of, and having carried out the role of Championship Driver previously I am delighted to do so once more.

“The course in Chile is one of the most exciting on the Extreme E calendar, so I am eager to jump back in and work alongside Patrick to help deliver one of the best events yet.”

GZ began the 2023 season with Carl Cox Motorsport, scoring a third-place finish alongside Timo Scheider at Race #1 of the Hydro X Prix. She was replaced by Lia Block for the rest of the calendar as she planned to focus on rally raid, which culminated in her being accepted for the 2024 Dakar Rally. GZ and former Chip Ganassi Racing driver Sara Price will join Nasser Al-Attiyah, Mattias Ekström, Cristina Gutiérrez, Jutta Kleinschmidt, Sébastien Loeb, Carlos Sainz, Laia Sanz, and Molly Taylor as Extreme E competitors with Dakar experience; Al-Attiyah, Ekström, Gutiérrez, Loeb, Sainz, and Sanz are also racing the 2024 edition.

She has raced in Extreme E since the inaugural season in 2021, driving for XITE Energy Racing that year followed by the first four races of the 2022 season for Veloce Racing.

Adrien Tambay is more than familiar with pavement racing, but has been finding more off-road opportunities in 2023. Next weekend, he will make his début in Extreme E driving for ABT CUPRA XE at the Copper X Prix.

Tambay is no stranger to ABT or CUPRA, racing for both teams in touring cars. He was a DTM regular for Audi Sport Team ABT from 2012 to 2015, scoring a best finish of third at the 2014 season opener in Hockenheim. With CUPRA, he won the 2022 FIA eTouring Car World Cup, holding off Extreme E regular Mattias Ekström for the title. In April, ABT CUPRA fielded a Formula E car for Tambay at the series’ rookie test in Tempelhof.

In January, he made his first off-road start in the snow and ice of the Race of Champions in Sweden. Representing France alongside 2022 Extreme E champion Sébastien Loeb, he defeated David Coulthard in the preliminary round before falling to Mick Schumacher at the individual tournament. Both were swept by eventual winner Norway in the Nations Cup.

“It’s my first foray into the off-road world so there’s a lot to learn, which makes the challenge even greater,” said Tambay. “I will do my best to repay the trust placed in me.

“Klara (Andersson) and the whole team have been great in helping me prepare at home, and now it’s on to the track. My goal is to learn quickly and avoid as many of the traps of the series as possible. I like the format of close racing against each other, which I have already done in some ice racing. I can’t wait to experience the Extreme E world now.”

Ondřej Martinec will miss the 2024 Dakar Classic after having to undergo heart surgery. He and co-driver Olga Roučková were supposed to share a Toyota Land Cruiser 90 under the Czech Samurais banner.

“It is a difficult decision for the entire team, but health and life come first and we will have to cancel Toyota’s participation in the Dakar Classic rally. Ollie fully supports Ondřej’s decision,” reads a statement from Czech Samurais. “We are so sorry and it hurts so much. Thank you all for your understanding and support.”

Martinec made his Dakar Classic debut in 2023 in a Land Cruiser with Gabriel Žúbor as his navigator, finishing thirty-seventh overall. Roučková, who previously raced the main Dakar Rally in a quad and SSV in 2018 and 2019, placed fifty-first overall and third in the H0 class in her Suzuki Samurai.

For the 2024 race, Czech Samurais was to unite Martinec and Roučková in the same Land Cruiser while also fielding a 1979 Citroën 2CV for Barbora Holická and Lucie Engová. The Citroën is nicknamed “Duckar” for its duck-themed livery and Holická’s programme to raise ducks at Safari Park Dvůr Králové; Holická will be racing the Dakar for the first time after competing in the Czech rally championship, which Engová also races as the navigator for her brother and ex-Formula One and Le Mans driver Tomáš Enge.

Their Land Cruiser formerly competed in the Intercontinental Rally, which runs along the original Dakar Rally route starting in Paris and finishing in Dakar, and was going to be scrapped before the team restored it. The car features a 3.4-litre six-cylinder engine with 230 horsepower, while the chassis has been modified.

Toyota revealed Monday the new Toyota Camry XSE that will compete in the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series, receiving an updated design after two years with the Toyota Camry TRD Next Gen.

“The foundation of Toyota’s presence in NASCAR is our commitment to continuous improvement on and off the race track. Our Camry XSE race car reinforces that mantra and accurately reflects the key design attributes of the all-new production Toyota Camry,” commented Toyota Racing Development president David Wilson. “As we prepare for the 2024 season, we look forward to working closely with our race team partners to optimise the performance of the newly-designed Camry race car so we can continue our legacy of leading laps, winning races and competing for championships with the Camry nameplate.”

As is the case with most stock cars, the Camry XSE’s design is based on its production model. Most notably, the car features a new nose that touts “hammerhead styling” on the front facia and an upper grille slot. The lower grille has new corner vents and hood ducts.

Along the rear, the car’s quarter panels have been redesigned with thinner taillights and bumper corners.

The car was designed in a partnership between TRD, Toyota Motor North America, and Calty Design Research. Calty is an American Toyota design studio that previously worked on Toyota’s other Cup cars.

Despite finishing third in the Quad category in 2023, Pablo Copetti will drop his plans of running his twelfth Dakar Rally in 2024. He had considered a switch to the SSV (formerly T4) class but lacked the funding.

Much of his decision to try a different category comes on the heels of the Amaury Sport Organisation‘s new criteria that a Quad rider must satisfy to race the Dakar, which he feels is hurting the category. Starting in 2024, those hoping to race in the Quad category must have either already run a Dakar Rally in the past five years (2018 to 2022), registered to compete in the 2023 or 2024 World Rally-Raid Championship, or run three W2RC races if they have not signed up to earn points.

The rule change was in response to a lack of manufacturer investment compared to bikes (every Quad rider in 2023 raced on a Yamaha Raptor with the exception of CFMOTO’s factory team) as well as favouring quality over quantity, though it also means there are only ten Quad riders taking part in the 2024 Dakar Rally. By comparison, bike applicants have significantly more laxer eligibility rules and those signing up for the 2025 Dakar Rally can use races as far back as July 2022 to bolster their résumés.

Consequently, there are only ten riders entered in the Quad class for 2024. Sixteen took part in the 2023 race.

“We tried to move to the UTV class but it was hard to get the money to compete,” wrote Copetti. “Why not quad? Because ASO made decisions that are killing the quad class. Only 10 quads this year! It’s a pitty [sic] because if they accept all the rider we could be almost 30!”

Can’t believe Christmas is only a month or so away and that I’m already busy trying to organise various programmes for 2024.

The good thing is that I’m talking to teams and sponsors coming off the back of a very successful 2023 season which makes a massive difference when negotiating deals.

It was one of my best seasons in motor racing, no question, running with great teams and having fantastic partners supporting me.

I picked up two championship titles and just missed out on another so all of the hard work, on and off the track, paid off and that’s why it’s important to get everything in line and organised for next season as soon as possible.   

So, looking back, let’s start with the title success. For the first time, I claimed overall GT Cup Championship honours along with car owner and “sporting driver” Paul Bailey. In the end, we finished over 50 points ahead of our nearest pursuers in the outright title race and a very healthy 185 points to the fore in the GTO category which I also won in 2021.