Image: Mitch Guthrie Jr. Ford Motorsport
While Toyota dominated on Monday, it was all change at Dakar 2026 on Tuesday as Ford fought back to control on Tuesday’s Day 3. On the day when Stellenbosch T3 Challenger lass Puck Klaassen made history to become the fifth woman ever to win a Dakar stage, American Mitch Guthrie and Kellon Walch and their factory Raptor led Czech duo Martin Prokop and Viktor Chytka’s privateer version with the best of the Toyotas, South African Guy Botterill, and Spaniard Oriol Mena’s SVR Gazoo Hilux third.
Dacia crews, Brazilian Lucas Moraes and Dennis Zenz and Spanish lady star Cristina Gutiérrez and Pablo Moreno were fourth and fifth with seven Fords in the top eleven. Frenchmen Mathieu Serradori and Loïc Minaudier’s South African made Century Factory CR-7 impressed in eighth behind two more Fords in the hands of Spanish crews, former car and bike winner Nani Roma and Álex Haro.
Another factory crew German Mattias Ekström and Emil Bergkvist’s Ford Raptor and independents, Kazakhstan crew Denis Krotov and Karel Zhiltsov and Frenchman Romain Dumas and Alex Winocq followed from the next of the Toyota horde, Polish privateers Eryk Goczal and Szymon Gospodarczyk in twelfth. Spanish Lady heroine Llia Sanz and Marco Gerini followed in another Century.
Another three independent Toyotas, Lithuanians, Benediktas Vanagas and Aisvydas Paliukenas were twelfth from Saudi Shaikh Al Qassimi and Khalid Alkendi, and 2025 winners, home hero Yazeed Al-Rajhi and Timo Gottschalk, with South African Champion Saood Variawa and Frenchman Francois Cazalet were the next factory Gazoo finishers, seventeenth in another SVR version seventeenth.
In what can be seen as the perfect response to Toyota’s dominance the previous day, five Fords now top the overall rankings with Guthrie leading privateer Prokop, Ekstrom, Sainz and Roma. Moraes and Guttirez’s Dacias sit sixth and seventh from Serradori’s Century and Variawa in the top Toyota. Overnight leader Al Attiyah slumped to tenth, eleven minutes off the pace in what is proving to be the most dramatically changing Dakar leaderboard most can remember.
Fords dominated all the way as Ekstrom, Roma and finally Guthrie took turns to lead with the rest all close behind. Variawa’s Toyota took the challenge to them running second early on before fading. The drive of the day came from Botterill, who rose from 21st to third, running well back in the pack. Of the factory Toyotas, Overdrive trio Henk Lategan, Toby Price, and Seth Quintero, as well as SVR man Joao Ferreira were all in the early chase but each found problems to sink out of the top twenty. Similar fates befell Dacia stars Al Attiyah and Loeb, and Century man Brian Baragwanath.
In amongst all of them, Dutch-South African lass Puck Klaassen made history to become the fifth woman ever to win a Dakar stage after Jutta Kleinschmidt, Cristina Gutiérrez, Sara Price, and Dania Akeel. Puck and Argentine Augusto Sanz in their KTM T3 Challenger left Pau Navarro to fight overall leader Yasis Seidan for second. American Brock Heger’s Polaris led the Side-by-Sides from Portuguese men João Monteiro’s Can-Am and Gonçalo Guerreiro’s Polaris as leader Xavier de Soultrait looked on.
Defender was back in charge of the Stock class. Mr. Dakar, Frenchman Stéphane Peterhansel and Michaël Metge led overall leaders, Lithuanians Rokas Baciuska and Oriol Vidal and US lady star Sara Price and Sean Berriman. Ronald Basso’s Toyota Land Cruiser however remains a thorn in their sides in second overall. And in the trucks, Ales Loprais narrowly led 2024 and ’25 winner and overall Martin Macik and Mitchel van den Brink’s similar Ivecos.
Wednesday’s race is the first part of the opening of two Marathon stages that heads deep into the desert’s no service refuge bivouacs.
