Toyota Gazoo Racing Baltics will field two Toyota Hiluxes at the 2024 Dakar Rally for team leader Benediktas Vanagas and Vladas Jurkevičius. Kuldar Sikk will serve as Vanagas’ co-driver on the #223 while Aisvydas Paliukėnas does so on Jurkevičius’ #240.
Vanagas will be running his twelfth Dakar, hoping to turn his luck around after crashing out of the last two. He has raced a Hilux since 2015 under the TGR Baltics banner, upgrading to one prepared by TGR proper in 2023. After Dakar, he has mainly raced in the FIA European Cup for Cross-Country Bajas or loaned his Hilux to other competitors including João Ramos and that year’s Dakar champion Nasser Al-Attiyah.
His #223, nicknamed BlackHawk VIII, retains its black livery with a Vytis (armoured knight riding a horse) as a nod to the Lithuanian coat of arms. Sikk remarked during the team reveal on Tuesday, “It’s black again,” to which Vanagas quipped, “Surprise, surprise.”
Sikk, who hails from fellow Baltic country Estonia, joined Vanagas in 2023. He is a longtime co-driver in the World Rally Championship.
“I would really like to finish it,” Sikk said with a laugh. “I think from that goal, we can do everything. I have been in rallying and in rallying it’s more easier to say that ‘I want to be third, first.’ In the Dakar, I think most of the people are going there to win, but actually you have to have a second thought: you have to finish, and if you finish, then you can have a shot.”
“You can tell a result only if you finish,” Vanagas added. “If you don’t finish, it doesn’t matter.”
Like Sikk, Jurkevičius boasts a decorated background in rallying. He won the Latvian Rally Championship-2 in 2022 and has also competed in the European and Estonian Rally Championships, as well as WRC-3. Paliukėnas also calls the shots as his navigator in rally.
In stark contrast to his team-mate, Jurkevičius’ #240 Hilux boasts a far more colourful livery modelled after the one used by his Škoda Fabia rally car. 2024 will be his maiden Dakar.
The team is among fourteen Hiluxes taking part in the 2024 Dakar Rally, set to begin on 5 January. The Hilux is the top rally raid vehicle today, having won the last two Dakar Rallies and both seasons of the World Rally-Raid Championship to date.