Although signed up to earn W2RC points like her Dacia colleagues, Cristina Gutiérrez is not doing the upcoming Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.

“Having impressed during the Dakar Rally with four top-10 stage times, Cristina Gutiérrez and Pablo Moreno will resume their W2RC campaign with The Dacia Sandriders later in the season,” reads a statement from Dacia.

A Tuesday update from the South African Safari Rally, the third round of the season, also did not mention Gutiérrez as among the early registrants alongside teammates Nasser Al-Attiyah and Sébastien Loeb.

While Al-Attiyah and Loeb were long slated to race full-time for the Dacia Sandriders, Gutiérrez’s schedule was more flexible due to her inexperience at the Ultimate level. In February 2024, team manager Tiphanie Isnard mentioned “keeping our options open for Cristina because we want to support her as she tackles increasingly tougher challenges. She’ll be developing a lot, so we’ll take it step by step and expand her calendar when the right time comes.”

Gutiérrez retired from her Ultimate debut at the 2024 Rallye du Maroc due to a mechanical failure. At the Dakar last month, she scored a best run of fifth in Stage #1 before her race was upended by a power steering failure in the Chrono Stage. Out of overall contention, she focused on supporting Loeb and Al-Attiyah by lending them parts when needed. She finished 41st in class.

Despite her absence from the second round, her navigator Pablo Moreno will be in Abu Dhabi as Rokas Baciuška’s navigator. Baciuška had finished 12th at Dakar with Oriol Mena, who is normally the co-driver for Eryk Goczał and returns to that post for the ADDC; Oriol Vidal is Baciuška’s usual navigator but has been plagued by back injuries since the 2024 Dakar.

Al-Attiyah enters Abu Dhabi as the defending winner and seeking his fifth triumph. He is currently third in the championship, 22 points behind Dakar champ Yazeed Al-Rajhi, while Loeb was disqualified from Dakar and thus has a lot of ground to make up.

“The Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge is like a continuation of the Dakar because we finished that event in the Empty Quarter and we are starting round two of the W2RC in the Empty Quarter,” Isnard added. “There has been very little time between the team’s return from the Dakar and to be ready to start the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, but they’ve done a great job to be ready in what have been intense conditions. They’ve remained focused despite a heavy workload and the fatigue they experienced working on an event as physically and mentally difficult as the Dakar.

“But we are intent on capitalizing on everything we achieved and learned on the Dakar; not just with the Dacia Sandrider, but how we operate and how our crews work and putting it all to good use on the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.

“Even though there hasn’t been much time since the Dakar, we’ve debriefed extensively with our crews and taken their feedback into account to be even stronger for the second event of the W2RC season when maximum points and progress will be the key targets.”

Featured image credit: Flavien Duhamel / Red Bull Content Pool