Maria Luis Gameiro to make Dakar Rally debut in 2025

After competing within the FIA World and European Baja Cups and nationwide championships near residence, Maria Luís Gameiro will enter the Dakar Rally for the primary time in 2025. She is going to race within the Challenger class below the Staff Motivo JCB banner, driving a Yamaha YXZ1000R Turbo Prototype from X-raid Staff with José Marques as navigator.

Gameiro often races a Mini JCW Rally Plus from X-raid within the Final class, primarily within the Baja Cups and within the Portuguese and Spanish Cross-Nation Rally Championships. Her 2024 itinerary based round races on the Iberian Peninsula such because the European Cup’s Baja TT Dehesa Extremadura and World Cup’s Baja Aragón, ending third at school within the former and eighth on the latter.

When the World Rally-Raid Championship got here to her native Portugal for the primary time in April for the BP Final Rally-Raid, Gameiro scored a tenth-place end in Final together with her Mini. In early October, she débuted in Challenger with a Yamaha however retired as a result of engine issues; the beginning got here shortly after being the primary girl to race the Baja Morocco, the place she positioned sixteenth in her maiden desert rally.

“We’ve been working arduous to make certain we’ll be at Dakar 2025,” stated Gameiro. “With the ability to affirm it’s a large duty, and likewise a supply of huge pleasure and delight. The whole lot occurred in a short time within the final two years. I really feel that the dedication of the crew is now bearing its greatest fruits. There may be nonetheless loads to be outlined and we now have many particulars to kind out, however an important factor is confirmed: we’re heading to Saudi Arabia to compete in Dakar 2025.”

Gameiro would be the first Portuguese girl to race the Dakar since Elisabete Jacinto, who made a number of begins on a motorbike and ultimately a automobile between 1998 and 2009. Coincidentally, Marques was her co-driver on the Africa Eco Race, which follows the Dakar’s authentic route that Jacinto ran on and which they gained in a truck in 2019.

Marques has run the Dakar six instances as a navigator. He made his début in 2006 with Helder Oliveira earlier than getting into the 2009 version with Partine Pereira. In 2021, 2023, and 2024, he referred to as the pictures for Gintas Petrus, ending twenty-eighth in Final on the newest race.

“Representing Portugal on the Dakar Rally is a superb supply of delight for me,” Gameiro continued. “No adjective I can use will do justice to this race’s legend. I’m about to meet a dream, and above all, I hope I’m as much as the problem. It’s no secret that we’ve been working arduous, and I do know I’m higher ready than I used to be two months in the past.

“Nonetheless, every part might be new for me in Saudi Arabia, and I don’t anticipate it to be straightforward. We’re working to verify every part goes as easily as attainable.”

The 2025 Dakar Rally will happen on 3–17 January.