The 2018 Dakar Rally was the 40th edition of the event and the tenth successive year that the event was in

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

. The event started in

Lima Lima ( ; ), founded in 1535 as the Ciudad de los Reyes (, Spanish for "City of Biblical Magi, Kings"), is the capital and largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón River, Chillón, Rímac River, Rímac and Lurín Rive ...

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

on 6 January and ran through

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

and

Bolivia Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...

, finishing in Córdoba,

on 20 January after 14 stages of competition.

Number of entries

Stages

Distance according to the official website.

Bikes, quads and cars

Trucks and UTVs

Summary

Stage 1 left from Lima on 6 January from the Army General Headquarters (the "Pentagonito") located in the district of San Borja, and extended 273 kilometers to the south, a few kilometers after Pisco taking the South Pan-American Highway. The competitive section consisted of a loop ran in the last 31 kilometers near Pisco. Among the incidents of the stage, the most highlighted was the serious accident suffered by the Portuguese driver Joaquim Rodrigues when he fell from a dune and fractured a lumbar vertebra. The oldest driver, 76-year old Yoshimasa Sugawara of Japan retired in his 35th Dakar Rally participation on Stage 2. The

Toyota is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturer headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi, Japan. It was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda and incorporated on August 28, 1937. Toyota is the List of manuf ...

of driver Alicia Reina and co-driver Carlos Dante Pelayo, both of Argentina, was burned after catching fire during the Stage 3 in Pisco, Peru. Two-time winner

Nani Roma Joan "Nani" Roma Cararach (born 17 February 1972) is a rally racing driver from Folgueroles, Barcelona, Spain. He won the Dakar Rally riding a motorcycle in 2004. Since then, he has entered the car category, taking the win in the 2014 edition ...

of Spain also retired at the end of Stage 3 when he had sustained head and neck injuries in a crash. Big troubles on Stage 4 was for two of the favorites, Nasser Al-Attiyah (Team

) and Cyril Despres (Team

Peugeot Peugeot (, , ) is a French automobile brand owned by Stellantis. The family business that preceded the current Peugeot companies was established in 1810, making it the oldest car company in the world. On 20 November 1858, Émile Peugeot applie ...

) that have been significantly delayed. The bikes class leader and defending champion Sam Sunderland was airlifted to hospital by helicopter as he quit the race with a frightening back injury. Also, former Chelsea and

Tottenham Tottenham (, , , ) is a district in north London, England, within the London Borough of Haringey. It is located in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Greater London. Tottenham is centred north-northeast of Charing Cross, ...

manager

André Villas-Boas Luís André de Pina Cabral e Villas-Boas (; born 17 October 1977) is a Portuguese sports executive, and former professional Manager (association football), football manager, who is currently the List of FC Porto presidents, president of Port ...

was taken to hospital when his car crashed into a sand dune, forcing him to retire from the rally. Notable retirement on Stage 5 was

Sébastien Loeb Sébastien Loeb (; born 26 February 1974) is a French professional rally, racing and rallycross driver. He is the most successful driver in the World Rally Championship (WRC), having won the world championship a record nine times in a row. He ho ...

(

Team Total) due to an injury of his co-driver Daniel Elena. In the quads category, defending champion Sergey Karyakin suffered a crash and broke his arm. Initially, Stage 5 in the truck category was won by class leader Eduard Nikolaev, but later Ayrat Mardeev and Dmitry Sotnikov received a compensation time and took first and second stage positions respectively. After the rest day, one of bike class favorites Joan Barreda won the Stage 7 by almost three minutes to creep ever closer to the overall lead, but sustained a knee injury. Car class leader

Stéphane Peterhansel Stéphane Peterhansel (born 6 August 1965) is a rally driver from France. He holds the record for wins at the Dakar Rally, with 14 victories. He currently drives for Team Audi Sport. Biography Peterhansel made his Paris to Dakar Rally debut in ...

had a big troubles on Stage 7, hitting a rock that destroyed the left rear corner of his Peugeot and forced him to stop for almost two hours. Despite losing two positions in general standings, Peterhansel come back to fight with Carlos Sainz by winning Stage 8 in southern Bolivia. Stage 9 has been cancelled due to poor weather conditions in Argentina. Bike class leader Adrien van Beveren could not finish on Stage 10 despite his efforts to keep going after he fell two miles from the finish. Austrian Matthias Walkner takes the advantage of the navigation error made by several rivals. On Stage 11, Joan Barreda, exhausted and nursing a knee injury for the last four days, has withdrawn from the rally despite sitting in second place. Russian Kamaz truck driver Eduard Nikolaev has dominated since the rally start in Peru, but he lost more than 40 minutes on a difficult Stage 11 to new race leader Federico Villagra. Heavy rain made conditions bad enough that the bike and quad classes were both cancelled for Stage 12. In the truck class, Kamaz's defending champion Eduard Nikolaev closely overhauled Federico Villagra's

Iveco Iveco S.p.A., an acronym for Industrial Vehicles Corporation, is an Italian multinational transport vehicle manufacturing company with headquarters in Turin, Italy. It designs and builds light, medium, and heavy Commercial vehicle, commercial veh ...

to lead the overall standings by just one second before the last two stages. On Stage 3, Villagra attacked but suffered a mechanical troubles and despite battling on for as long as he could, had to abandon the rally, leaving the Russian in total control. In the same time, 13-time champion Peterhansel crashed on Stage 13, damaging the Peugeot 3008 DKR Maxi and lost an hour and his second place in general classification. Finally, after last short Stage 14, Spanish Carlos Sainz has won the cars class for the second time, the bikes winner was Austrian Matthias Walkner, the quads winner was Chilean Ignacio Casale, the trucks winner was Russian Eduard Nikolaev and the UTVs winner was Brazilian Reinaldo Varela.

Stage results

Cars

Bikes

Quads

Trucks

UTVs

Final standings

Cars

Bikes

Quads

Trucks

UTVs

Entry lists

Bikes

Quads

Cars

Trucks

UTVs

References

{{Dakar Rally Dakar Rally by year

Dakar Rally The Dakar Rally () or simply "The Dakar" (), formerly known as the Paris–Dakar Rally (), is an annual rally raid organised by the Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO). It is an off-road endurance event traversing terrain much tougher than convent ...

Sport in Córdoba, Argentina