For a few years now, New Atlas has picked some of its favorite pictures from the grueling, multi-thousand-mile desert race called the Dakar Rally. Dozens of professional photographers from around the world compete to take the most iconic and most amazing desert images from this most amazing and most iconic desert competition.
Having personally been a motorsports photographer and enthusiast for nearly half my life, I decided to throw my hat into the ring and sift through thousands of photos from this year's Dakar to find the cream of the crop. The criteria: "It has to be rad."
This year, we chose 22 pictures. Each one tells a story of just how crazy this race is and how inhospitable the Saudi desert can be. But also how magnificent and beautiful it is. You can click on any image to go to the gallery.
The Dakar Rally has a storied history and true to form, the 2025 Dakar surprised us with a bit of a shakeup from years past.
Stéphane Peterhansel was a no-show for the first time in 36 years. Granted, "Monsieur Dakar" is 59 years old, and he's raced 35 of them in a row, winning 14 times.
Carlos Sainz, a four-time Dakar winner had an early tip-over in Stage 2 that resulted in a damaged roll cage. The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) forced Sainz to withdraw per regulations that any damage to the roll cage compromises the vehicle's safety. To be fair, the Ford Raptor looked to be in rough shape after his rollover.
Another fan favorite, Sébastien Loeb, the winningest World Rally Championship (WRC) champion in the history of World Rally, rolled his Dacia Sandrider in Stage 3, also damaging his roll cage, so was also forced to retire from the race early.
Five-time winner and fellow Dacier teammate to Loeb, Nasser Al-Attiyah along with co-driver, Edouard Boulanger, finished fourth in the cars class after a couple of tire punctures and a time penalty for losing a spare tire in the desert.
That left the door wide open for local businessman and rally racer, Yazeed Al-Rajhi of Saudi Arabia and German co-driver Timo Gottschalk, who finished first in cars aboard their Toyota Hilux Overdrive vehicle. Al-Rajhi became the first Saudi to ever win the Dakar Rally.
Two-time Dakar winner and favorite in the bikes category, Kevin Benavides, struggled with an injury prior to the Dakar and retired mid-way through this year's race.
Australian Toby Price has won a pair of rallies on bikes in recent years but made the jump to four wheels this year. Unfortunately, he and his co-driver, Sam Sunderland, made a premature exit after only six stages when Sunderland suffered a concussion after an impact driving their Toyota Hilux T1+.
Another Aussie stepped it up in the bike class in Price's absence and Daniel Sanders won his first Dakar on his Red Bull KTM Factory Racing 450cc machine for 2025. Sanders led the rally from the prologue until the final stage. The last person to achieve such a feat was Marc Coma back in 2009.
Be sure to check out all 22 photos in the gallery!
If you'd like to see some of the past New Atlas "best of" galleries from Dakar, you can find them here: Torture test: Spectacular photos from the 2018 Dakar Rally, The agony and the ecstasy: Otherworldly photos from the spectacular Dakar rally (2019), and 2020 Dakar Rally in Saudi Arabia was a photographic feast
Source: Dakar