X-raid Team to race MINI Cooper Plus in T1+ at Dakar 2023

A new manufacturer has joined the 2023 Dakar Rally‘s T1+ battle. On Monday, X-raid Team announced they will field the Mini John Cooper Works Rally Plus in the T1+ category with Jakub Przygonski and Sebastian Halpern as their drivers.

X-raid has raced the Mini JCW at the Dakar Rally since 2017. As the T1+ category’s name suggests, the Plus model is an upgraded car with differences like a wider front and better aerodynamics.

The JCW Rally Plus will be powered by a hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) biofuel that is made from plastic bottles and vegetable fat. Some Dakar competitors have used HVO in the past like KH-7 Epsilon Team, whose 2022 truck blended HVO with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) but will shift towards hydrogen in 2023.

“Sustainability is clearly at the forefront of our forward-looking MINI JCW Rally Plus project,” said team director Sven Quandt. “The future, motorsport will have to get used to the fact that without sustainability there will be no more motorsport. In this respect, it was clearly a matter of the heart for us that we will operate the ninth MINI more sustainably. With HVO, we are entering new territory for the cross-country scene and I am looking forward to introducing our latest addition to the family, the MINI JCW Rally Plus with significant aerodynamic changes.

“In our opinion, HVO fuel is an important complement to other low-emission powertrains, and not just in motorsport. The Dakar offers a very good platform to test this fuel and raise awareness.”

Only two other companies have T1+ vehicles as Toyota fields the Hilux T1+ while Prodrive has the Hunter. Multiple drivers have joined the subcategory for the 2023 Rally including Isidre Esteve, Tomas Ouředníček, and Benediktas Vanagas in the Hilux and Guerlain Chicherit and Vaidotas Žala in the Hunter. Supply chain issues have mostly prevented potential marques from opening T1+ programmes, though Ford intends to do the same with the Ranger T1+ in a future Dakar Rally.

Przygonski will race the #203 with Armand Monleón as co-driver, while Halpern is joined by Bernardo Graue in the #212. The duo scored top-ten finishes at the 2022 Dakar Rally with Przygonski in sixth and Halpern eighth. They were the highest finishing non-T1+ entries.

X-raid Team will also have two JCW Buggies in the T1.2 class for Denis Krotov and Khalid Al Qassimi. Outside of T1, the German outfit is bringing seven Yamaha YXZ1000R Turbo Prototypes to Dakar in T3.

The 2023 Dakar Rally begins on 31 December 2022.

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