2023 Rallye du Maroc: Nasser Al-Attiyah clinches championship with Stage 2 win

Nasser Al-Attiyah could skip the rest of the Rallye du Maroc and still walk away with his second World Rally-Raid Championship. After winning Stage #2 on Sunday while his closest rival Yazeed Al-Rajhi finished fourth, Al-Attiyah is far enough in the standings that even a retirement while Al-Rajhi sweeps the rest of the event would result in a tie at most that is broken by wins, which Al-Attiyah holds.

Entering the season-ending round in Morocco, Al-Attiyah led Al-Rajhi by 51 points. The margin increased by one after they respectively finished first and second in Stage #1, while Al-Rajhi missing the Sunday podium while Al-Attiyah won the stage now makes the score 199 to 144. Should Al-Rajhi win the next three legs and the overall, it would only produce thirty-five points total (five points per stage win, thirty for winning outright).

“I’m absolutely happy to have defended our title from last year,” said Al-Attiyah. “Yesterday, we started thirty-eighth and we won the stage. Today we opened and we win the stage. It’s amazing, especially as everybody is here.”

While the main FIA world championship picture—which includes all three major classes but is a de facto T1 championship as the top category does not have its own trophy like the others—has mostly crystallised, it remains in the air in T3. Mitch Guthrie gained some relief in that points battle as he edged out Austin Jones and Seth Quintero for the Stage #2 victory; the Americans were separated by just nine points going into Morocco.

Eryk Goczał played spoiler by winning Stage #1, but the front differential broke 111 kilometres into the next day followed by the rear diff 100 km before the finish, which allowed the Americans to scramble for much-needed points. Thanks to his second- and third-place stage finishes, Quintero leads the T3 overall by 1:22 over Guthrie. Jones has a more uphill battle as he tails by twelve and a half minutes.

Rokas Baciuška, another T4 to T3 graduate fresh off clinching the former’s title, suffered a broken rear suspension arm with twenty-nine kilometres remaining.

After a late error ruined his Saturday, Tosha Schareina rebounded to dominate Stage #2 in RallyGP. Toby Price, who has been dealing with an illness in his throat since the rally began that caused him to lose his voice, finished second but tops among W2RC-eligible riders to improve to runner-up overall behind Ross Branch while current championship leader Luciano Benavides is fifth. If the season ended Sunday, both Price and Benavides would be tied at 91 points apiece, with Benavides holding the tiebreaker as his second to Schareina at the Desafío Ruta 40 counts as a win.

Modestas Siliunas retired from the race after a frightening accident in which he fell off his bike before it was hit and burst into flames. Fellow Lithuanian and Quad points leader Laisvydas Kancius unsuccessfully attempted to put out the blaze by doing doughnuts to kick up dirt onto the KTM 450. Siliunas walked away unhurt.

While Siliunas avoided injury, his Rally2 peer Matthieu Jauffraud was not as fortunate as he suffered a ruptured Achilles and fractured tibia after losing control of his bike while ascending a dune. Although he avoided crashing, the landing and its results were enough to take him out of the rally. Konrad Dąbrowski, another classmate, bowed out with a concussion and shoulder injury after crashing.

Massimo Camurri‘s Rally3 pursuit took a hit as he was forced to retire, unable to complete the stage due to knee pain stemming from an accident in Stage #1. He was twenty points behind Ardit Kurtaj, who finished fourth in class on Sunday, prior to Morocco.

Sara Price notched her first W2RC stage win in T4 after claiming three National Car/UTV legs at the Sonora Rally en route to qualifying for the 2024 Dakar Rally. Team-mate João Ferreira had a slow start due to an early error and missed out on a podium, but still took the overall lead after Enrico Gaspari suffered his own issues.

In T5, Janus van Kasteren bounced back from a disastrous start to the rally to win his class. He is still an hour back of overall leader Martin Macík Jr., who is still trying to put enough distance between himself and van Kasteren to steal the championship.

Stage #2 winners

Class	Number	Competitor	Team	Time
T1	200	Nasser Al-Attiyah	Toyota Gazoo Racing	2:52:29
T2	250	Akira Miura*	Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body	4:12:42
T3	300	Mitch Guthrie	Red Bull Off-Road Junior Team	3:10:14
T4	410	Sara Price*	South Racing Can-Am	3:45:27
T5	500	Janus van Kasteren	Team de Rooy	3:30:26
RallyGP	68	Tosha Schareina*	Honda Team	3:02:15
Rally2	33	Michael Docherty	BAS World KTM Racing Team	3:08:59
Rally3	162	Romain Monnot	Romain Monnot	3:47:19
Quad	183	Manuel Andújar	7240 Team	3:49:21
Open Auto	601	Jérôme Cambier*	MD Rallye Sport	4:24:43
Open SSV	656	Talutis Algirdas*	BRO Racing	4:08:29

* – Not competing in World Rally-Raid Championship

Leaders after Stage #2

Class	Number	Competitor	Team	Time
T1	200	Nasser Al-Attiyah	Toyota Gazoo Racing	6:08:01
T2	250	Akira Miura*	Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body	9:08:21
T3	302	Seth Quintero	Red Bull Off-Road Junior Team	6:48:23
T4	403	João Ferreira	South Racing Can-Am	8:13:30
T5	501	Martin Macík Jr.	MM Technology	8:38:36
RallyGP	16	Ross Branch	Hero MotoSports	7:18:15
Rally2	32	Bradley Cox	BAS World KTM Racing Team	7:45:38
Rally3	164	Cheikh Yves Jacquemain	Africa Rallye Team	10:48:20
Quad	183	Manuel Andújar	7240 Team	8:57:59
Open Auto	601	Jérôme Cambier*	MD Rallye Sport	9:42:26
Open SSV	653	Tomas Mickus*	BRO Racing	9:26:54