Red Bull KTM’s Daniel Sanders takes maiden victory

Daniel Sanders wins the 2025 Dakar Rally for Red Bull KTM – final stage 12 results sees the Australian take victory ahead of Monster Energy Honda’s Tosha Schareina and Adrien Van Beveren.

• The final day at Dakar is never a done deal. A handful of years ago the race was decided by a matter of seconds on the final stage between KTM teammates Kevin Benavides and Toby Price, in favour of the Argentinian.
• Not this year as Daniel Sanders takes a remarkable start-to-finish win for KTM and completes the rare honour of winning the Dakar and ISDE outright with a winning margin of 8m50s after 53h08m52s on his bike across the 12 stages.
• The Tosha Schareina, Adrien Van Beveren and Ricky BrabecHonda red army have sat behind an unassailable Sanders for the entire two weeks. But a confident ride from day one left all Daniels major rivals reflecting on ifs and buts of their own time lost on week one.
• The final 61 kilometres today was long enough, around an hour to complete and with a mass start which is a rarity for these guys who spend so much time alone in the desert.
• Easy enough you might think but as always with Dakar there was just enough jeopardy thrown in to make the butterflies swirl around.
• Sanders the racer set off from teh start and dusted his rivals, leading the pack as it ripped down the flat piste like Dakar of years gone by when it used to conclude on the shores of Lac Rose in Senagal…just up the road from Dakar funnily enough.
• Adrien Van Beveren took his chance to race like he was on Le Touquet beach once again and ran an early lead. But he was to be denied a stage win this Dakar by South African Michael Docherty who clocked in just three seconds faster to take his second stage win of his career.
• But the limelight was reserved for Sanders who completes the round 20 wins for KTM (who could do with a bit of good PR at the moment!).

• Honda will swamp the overall podium in red with four of the top six riders in the factory HRC team. Spaniard Tosha Schareina finished in second place, the youngest rider on the Honda team bettering Adrien Van Beveren who achieves his second podium on the bounce.
• Speaking of good PR for KTM, 19-year-old Dakar rookie Edgar Canet took it easy on the last day to claim the Rally 2 class win and an overall top 10. Not the best rookie appearance by a KTM rider it must be noted, we think Toby Price has that honour, but not half bad from the Spaniard who has a bright future in orange.
• Canet finishes ahead of Tobias Ebster, last year’s Original by Motul winner also on a KTM and Romain Dumontier on the customer Honda.
• The biggest contest today was in the Originals class where just one minute separated Benjamin Melot and Emanuel Gyenes. It was the Romanian Gyenes who pipped his French rival at the post, deciding the race in the last kilometres.
• Shout out to Sandra Gomez, the only female in the ’25 Dakar and who has finished in 43rd place on the Fantic. She clocks a full 15 hours more riding time than the winner Sanders.