Dakar 2025 – Prologue: Henk Lategan best time

The competitors of the Dakar 2025 have embarked on the route of the world’s largest rally-raid, which will take them over nearly 8,000 kilometers through the treacherous dunes and winding canyons of the Saudi desert.

For this timed appetizer of around thirty kilometers around Bisha, it was Toyota driver Henk Lategan who clocked the best time, one second ahead of Ford’s Mattias Ekström, last year’s prologue winner, and twenty seconds ahead of the Dacia driven by five-time winner Nasser Al-Attiyah. The three major manufacturers and favorites of this Dakar 2025 are thus already in the game from the very first kilometers.

We must look at the seventh place to find Sébastien Loeb and his co-driver Fabian Lurquin. The nine-time WRC world champion has big ambitions for this Dakar and aims to make the Dacia colors shine for the Romanian brand’s grand debut in this rally. The defending champion Carlos Sainz didn’t take any risks with his Ford Raptor, while Guillaume de Mevius, who was a surprising second last year, suffered a puncture on his Mini and finished beyond the 50th place.

This prologue, which is not taken into account for the overall ranking, serves to determine the starting order for the first stage scheduled for tomorrow. Thus, the teams with the ten best times can choose when they wish to start the 499-kilometer challenge awaiting them on Saturday, again around Bisha.

Prologue Classification