BONUS - RUSTENBURG - With three months to go before the FIA World Rally-Raid Championship (W2RC) hosts its first event in South Africa, the highly anticipated South African Safari Rally has already attracted an exceptionally high calibre of entries in the car category.
The South African Safari Rally, brought to you by Toyota Gazoo Racing, takes place from 18 to 24 May, and forms round three of this year’s extremely competitive W2RC season. It follows January’s action-packed Dakar Rally and the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge that runs from 21-27 February.
“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 South African 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 Nasser 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. This is backed up by no less than five FIA World Cup for Cross-Country Rallies titles, as well as five Dakar Rally wins.
Al-Attiyah/Boulanger finished fourth overall at this year’s Dakar, and will be joined by Dacia Sandriders team-mates Sebastian Loeb (France) and co-driver Fabian Lurguin (Belgium). Loeb is a nine-time World Rally champion, has finished on the Dakar Rally podium five times, and earned the W2RC runner-up position in 2022, making him another formidable competitor. While Toyota Gazoo Racing is yet to confirm its entries, there’s no doubt that it will field a formidable line-up of international and South African drivers and co-drivers – many of which starred in this year’s Dakar Rally.
Three South African produced Century Racing cars have been entered thus 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 South Africa, has an impressive line-up of six teams eager to go racing in the South African Safari Rally. Four competitors will be in the Red-Lined Revo, comprising Rients Hofstra (Netherlands) and South African co-driver Wade Harris, and the all-local crews of Philip Botha/Roelof Janse van Vuuren, Danie Ludick/Denzil Williamson and Jayden Els/Johan Swemmer. There will be two local crews in the Red-Lined VK56 entries, comprising Gerhardt and Rudi Heinlein, and Nickus Heinlein/Ferdie Kriel.
There will also be two South African-built WCT VW Amaroks, compri- sing Daniel Schröder (Germany) and Henri Köhne (South Africa) 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.
With numerous other top-ranking teams still expected to submit their entries in the Ultimate, Challenger and SSV categories following the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, rally-raid enthusiasts can look forward to plenty of action and excitement when the W2RC fraternity heads to South Africa in May.
The closing date for entries is 30 April 2025.
