SA Safari Rally has attracted big Dakar names

Dakar Rally star Nasser al-Attiyah will be one of the high-profile entries in the inaugural SA Safari Rally in May.

Sponsored by Toyota Gazoo Racing, the event on May 18-24 is the third round of the 2025 FIA World Rally-Raid Championship (W2RC), and follows January’s Dakar Rally and the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge from February 21-27. It will take place in North West and Limpopo, with race headquarters at Sun City.

“We are delighted with the number and calibre of competitors that submitted their entries by the closing date of the early bird entries on 14 February,” said Archie Rutherford, CEO of the SA Safari Rally.

“We’ve had a fantastic response and great interest from around the world for this new addition to the World Rally-Raid Championship calendar, and our team is hard at work ensuring that we deliver a truly world-class event for the competitors, media and spectators.”

Headlining the entries received in the Ultimate (T1+) car category is Qatari star al-Attiyah and French co-driver Edouard Boulanger from The Dacia Sandriders team. Al-Attiyah is not only the reigning W2RC champion but has won all three titles since this premier international rally-raid championship debuted in 2022. He has FIA World Cup for Cross-Country Rallies titles, as well as five Dakar Rally wins.

Al-Attiyah finished fourth overall at this year’s Dakar and will be joined by Dacia Sandriders teammates Sebastian Loeb (France) and co-driver Fabian Lurguin (Belgium). Loeb is a nine-time World Rally champion and has finished on the Dakar Rally podium five times. 

Toyota Gazoo Racing is yet to confirm its entries but is expected to field the drivers who starred in this year’s Dakar Rally.

They will be joined by the X-Raid MINI JCW crews of Portuguese duo Joao Ferreira and Filipe Palmeiro, and the second car of Denos Krotov (Kyrgyzstan) and Konstantin Zhiltsov (Israel).

Having earned impressive third- and fifth-place finishes overall on its first outing with its Ford Raptor at this year’s Dakar Rally, the Ford M-Sport team has submitted two entries for the SA Safari Rally, but its driver and co-driver pairings have yet to be named.

Martin Prokop and Victor Chytka (Czech Republic) are stalwarts of the rally-raid scene and will also be in action in SA in their Ford Raptor RS Cross Country. 

With SA-designed and -produced rally-raid vehicles accounting for more than half of the Dakar Rally field, five-time Brazilian Cross Country champions and multiple Dakar Rally competitors Marcos Baumgart and Kleber Cincea will be competing in the locally built Neil Woolridge Motorsport Ford Ranger Evo Plus.

Three SA-produced Century Racing cars have been entered so far, comprising the two French teams of Dakar stage winners Mathieu Serradori and Loic Minaudier in the CR-7T and Benoit Frentin and Cedric Duple in a CR6, along with Rik van den Brink and Gydo Heimans (Netherlands) in another CR-7T.

Red-Lined Motorsport, also from SA, has six teams lined up for the SA Safari Rally. Four competitors will be in the Red-Lined Revo, comprising Rients Hofstra (Netherlands) and SA co-driver Wade Harris, and the all-local crews of Philip Botha/Roelof Janse van Vuren, Danie Ludick/Denzil Williamson and Jayden Els/Johan Swemmer. There will be two local crews in the Red-Lined VK56 entries, comprising Gerhard and Rudi Heinlein, and Nickus Heinlein/Ferdie Kriel.

There will also be two SA-built WCT VW Amaroks, comprising Daniel Schröder (Germany) and Henry Köhne (SA) who are competing in the full W2RC season this year. They will be supported in the local event by Schröder’s father Jürgen in the second WCT Amarok (co-driver still to be confirmed).

They will be joined by the father and son team of Johan and Sean van Staden in the KEC Racing Renault Duster.