W2RC 2025 result after Round 1: Dakar Rally

The epic opening challenge of the five-round 2025 World Rally-Raid Championship (W2RC) was the infamous Dakar Rally – a 5,000-mile, 14-day marathon that Toyota Gazoo Racing took on with a six-car team that offered a mix of youthful energy and decades of experience. What was the story behind Toyota’s fantastic W2RC 2025 result and one-two finish for the GR Hilux Evo? Read on to find out…

W2RC 2025 result: Dakar Rally

Prologue

Although not a countable part of the Dakar, the results of this 18-mile-long pre-race determined the starting positions for stage one. All six TGR crews completed the stage without issue but the standout performance came from Henk Lategan and Brett Cummings in the #211 GR Hilux Evo, who delivered a dream first-place finish. Lategan described this Prologue result as “a big sigh of relief” after last year’s absence due to injury. The five remaining TGR crews finished between eighth and 21st place, which represented time differences from the lead of 35-72 seconds.

Stage 1

This first true stage of the Dakar Rally set the tone for the days to come. It pummelled competitors with a 257-mile loop of rocks, sand and fast dirt tracks, interspersed with 53 miles of liaisons. Despite this, all six TGR crews completed the course without serious issues and four finished in the top ten. Pick of the bunch this time was Seth Quintero and Dennis Zenz (#204), who set a benchmark time that was almost nine minutes ahead of the second-placed crew.

While some competitors strategised their performance in advance of the feared 48-hour-long stage two, Quintero did not hold back. Nevertheless, the crew’s clean run wasn’t without drama as the pair lost time mid-stage to assist a fellow competitor who crashed in front of them. The organisers rewarded this selfless act and adjusted their time accordingly.

Best stage result: 1 (#204 – Quintero/Zenz)
Overall position: 1 (#204 – Quintero/Zenz)

Stage 2

This was the infamous 48-hour ‘Chrono’ – essentially two stages rolled into one 600-mile challenge, run over consecutive days with an overnight camp in a remote bivouac in the desert. The stage remained officially active through the night, which meant that communication between crew and team was not allowed, and no services could be conducted on the vehicles.

Following their win the day before, Quintero and Zenz opened the stage in their #204 Hilux, a daunting task because there were no tracks to follow. As the first crew to tackle the first dunes of the rally, the route took a toll on their time. But they weren’t alone in struggling with the terrain. Many teams battled damper failures, electronic glitches, and being beached in the sand.

Nevertheless, Lategan and Cummings survived to record exceptional results. Although they trailed the eventual stage winners by almost seven minutes, the crew’s well-judged pace elevated the #211 Hilux into first place overall.

Less fortunate were the TGR crews in cars #206 and #218. In what can only be described as a most unfortunate accident just 40km from the finish, the two crews collided in thick dust while looking for the correct route. At this point in the rally, Giniel de Villers and Dirk von Zitzewitz (#206) had moved up into eighth place, so it was decided that they would salvage repair parts from Saood Variawa and Francois Cazalet’s car in order to minimise the veterans’ losses. As a result, Variawa and Cazalet tumbled down the order as they faced the massive challenge of nursing their broken car to the end of the stage.

Best stage result: 4 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 3

Following heavy rain in the area, the timed area of Stage 3 was shortened to around 200 miles – a relief for many following the rigours of the past two days. But no crew was more delighted with the day’s result than Variawa and Cazalet in the #218 Hilux. Firstly, because the TGR technicians had managed to fully repair their car but, secondly, the young duo went on to take stage victory despite suffering a puncture in the closing miles of the day. That performance also set a new record for Variawa as the youngest Dakar stage winner in his class.

Despite this stunning bounce-back, the pair remained well behind the leaders, team-mates Lategan and Cummings. The South African pair employed their experience to drive another steady stage through rocky conditions. Though plagued by faulty navigation equipment, they still managed to restrict time loss and once again increased their lead in the overall standings. Stage 3 also saw a fantastic performance from Quintero and Zenz, who secured a position in the coveted top ten.

Best stage result: 1 (#218 – Variawa/Cazalet)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 4

This first half of the so-called Marathon Stage caused multiple upsets among the top competitors, with punctures largely dictating the outcome. The course was opened by Variawa and Cazalet, who enjoyed a virtually trouble-free first 100 miles before suffering the first of two punctures. As the Hilux only carries two spares, crews were forced into moderating their pace over the remainder of the stage in order to preserve their tyres.

Five of the TGR crews sustained one or two punctures but Lucas Moraes and Armand Monleon (#203) suffered three, which meant that they had to wait for assistance from a fellow competitor. Meanwhile, Giniel de Villiers and Dirk von Zitzewitz (#206) forgot to attach the battery to their cordless power tool, so their puncture took an agonising ten minutes to change manually. Finally, and despite suffering two punctures, Lategan and Cummings set the second-fastest time through the rocky course, enough to retain their overall lead in the rally.

Best stage result: 2 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 5

Stage 5 represented the second half of the Marathon Stage, which meant competitors had to attack the day following another overnight in the desert with no service crew back-up. Supplies were limited and many continued to suffer more punctures than they had tyres, forcing crews to stop and hope for support from team-mates. Success was therefore less about speed and more about luck in a competition-wide game of puncture roulette.

The outcome was impossible to call in advance because of the caterpillar effect of crews constantly starting and stopping. However, the 265-mile stage was eventually won by Quintero and Zenz who bested the second-placed team by a single second, which in turn promoted them into the overall top ten. At this conclusion of the Dakar Rally’s first week, Lategan and Cummings remained at the top of the standings, albeit with little more than ten seconds of breathing space.

Best stage result: 1 (#204 – Quintero/Zenz)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

W2RC 2025 result: Dakar Rally

Stage 6

Following their win in the previous stage, Quintero and Zenz had the tough task of opening Stage 6. As the early part of the 375-mile route was peppered with rocks, the American opted for a more cautious approach and therefore recorded a clean run that secured them eighth place overall. Much less fortunate was TGR’s veteran duo, because von Zitzewitz injured his neck while covering rough terrain mid-stage. This forced de Villiers to slow right down and get his co-driver safely to the finish line where he could be evaluated and treated at the bivouac. It was later decided that von Zitzewitz could not continue the event – a disappointing and premature end to de Villiers’ final race with TGR.

The day’s most solid performance came from Guy Botterill and Dennis Murphy in the #205 Hilux. The first half of the Dakar had seen the pair make conistent progress through the field as they inched back into contention following an early mechanical problem. But this was the stage they showed their mettle by spending most of the day in the lead. It was only a small navigational error between the final waypoint and the finish that precluded them from a stage win.

Best stage result: 4 (#205 – Botteril/Murphy)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

W2RC 2025: Stage 7

After the disappointment of the previous day, Stage 7 brought a welcome first win for Lucas Moraes and co-driver Armand Monleon in the #203 Hilux. Crossing the finish line after more than four gruelling hours, the pair posted a time that was well clear of the next-fastest crew – approximately the same amount of time that overall race leaders Lategan and Cummings lost in the same stage.

Starting seventh, the crew in the #211 Hilux wasted little time overtaking slower-moving traffic to take the lead position. However, this created the disadvantage of opening the rest of the route. Nevertheless, Lategan enjoyed a near-perfect drive and Cummings even managed to help find a very tricky waypoint mid-stage that significantly increased their lead. But due to an error in the roadbook, the organisers decided to delete that section of the route, which negated their advantage. As a result, their lead was cut from more than seven minutes after Stage 6 to just 21 seconds after Stage 7.

Best stage result: 1 (#203 – Moraes/Monleon)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 8

Having been freed from their role as a support car and water carrier for the lead #211 Hilux (this responsibility had now been handed to Variawa and Cazalet), Botterill and Murphy in the #205 car set a blistering pace through Stage 8 – a 300-mile route through extemely testing tracks and dunes plus another 150 miles of liaisons. But a puncture near the end of the stage cost them the win.

In the end it was Lategan and Cummings who set the benchmark time, less than two minutes clear of their teammates. This dream team has led the Dakar since Stage 2, and their result marked TGR’s fifth stage victory. More than that, thanks to the stunning efforts of privateer team Overdrive Racing, a Toyota Hilux has won seven of the first eight stages.

Best stage result: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 9

This was a tough stage for the TGR crews, most of all as a result of Botterill and Murphy’s full-throttle, sixth-gear crash-out. Thankfully, the crew escaped injury during the vehicle’s multiple rolls but the car and their hopes for continuing the race were totally destroyed. Meanwhile, both Quintero and Zenz and Moraes and Monleon incurred 15-minute penalties for missing waypoints, and then Variawa and Cazalet lost almost ten minutes getting stuck in camel grass.

The front-running crew of Lategan and Cummings enjoyed a mostly trouble-free day, although an early navigational error as the pair opened the stage gave their closest competitors the opportunity to close in. By the time the dust had settled, the #201 crew of Al Rajhi and Gottschalk of Overdrive Racing had moved into the lead. The positive to this was that this privately run team was also campaigning a GR Hilux Evo – so the Dakar Rally was now a Toyota one-two.

Best stage result: 11 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)
Overall position: 2 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 10

This stage provided a strategic battleground for the top two Toyota crews, as the starting position for the following day is often pivotal in the outcome of the Dakar. For Lategan and Cummings in the works Hilux the stage brought redemption, with the crew besting their rivals by close to ten minutes over the dune-filled, 75-mile route. This elevated the #211 Hilux back into first place with a lead of 87 seconds and just two stages to go.

Fastest of the TGR crews in this stage was Moraes and Monleon in the #203 car. Their time was just 18 seconds behind the stage winners, a result that puts the crew back in the top 15 and sets them up to start second on the road on the penultimate day.

Best stage result: 2 (#203 – Moraes/Monleon)
Overall position: 1 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 11

This penultimate stage saw an all-Toyota showdown in Saudi Arabia’s Empty Quarter. TGR’s Lategan and Cummings started the day as overall rally leaders, but their road position counted against them during the 170-mile route. They drove at a fast pace through the sea of sand and quickly caught up with the cars at the front, which put them at a clear disadvantage as they opened the rest of the virgin dunes.

This opened the door for Al Rajhi and Gottschalk in Overdrive’s privately entered Hilux. Having started a little further back, the pair set the third-fastest time, which was enough to give them the outright lead by just over six minutes coming into the final day.

Best stage result: 5 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)
Overall position: 2 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

Stage 12

The final stage of the 2025 Dakar Rally brought not only victory for Toyota but also a second place overall for TGR’s Lategan and Cummings in the #211 GR Hilux Evo. The works crew had led the race for nine stages but eventually lost out to the privately run Overdrive Racing team and its own GR Hilux Evo. The margin was tiny too – just under four minutes after two weeks and 5,000 miles of racing across the Saudi Arabian landscape.

Overall, Toyota won all but four stages of the 12-stage event, as well as the Prologue in Bisha. Toyota also secured four spots in the overall top ten, including first and second place. This was a power performance that underscored the quality, durability and reliability for which the Toyota Hilux is famous. The team will continue to improve on the car, however, as part of our ethos of creating ever-better cars not only for motorsport, but also for its customers.

Best stage result: 1 (#203 – Moraes/Monleon)
Overall W2RC 2025 position: 2 (#211 – Lategan/Cummings)

W2RC 2025 results: Dakar Rally final standings

W2RC 2025: manufacturer championship standings

W2RC 2025 programme

There are five rounds in the W2RC 2025 programme. All six Toyota Gazoo Racing teams competed in the Dakar Rally launch event. And while rounds two, four and five will be tackled by cars #203 (Lucas Moraes and Armand Monleón) and #204 (Seth Quintero and Dennis Zenz), a full complement of cars will again compete in round three in South Africa.

Round one: Dakar Rally, Saudi Arabia, 3-17 January
Round two: Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, United Arab Emirates, 21-27 February
Round three: Safari Rally, South Africa, 18-24 May
Round four: BP Ultimate Rally Raid, Portugal, 22-28 September
Round five: Rallye du Maroc, Morocco, 10-17 October

Learn more: How did Toyota end the W2RC 2024 season?