Yamaha’s new Ténéré 700 Rally GYTR bike will make its debut next week at the Carta Rallye, piloted by Alessandro Botturi and Gautier Paulin.

The bike is based on the regular 2025 Ténéré 700 Rally, though as its name suggests features more upgrades courtesy of Genuine Yamaha Technology Racing. GYTR is also responsible for the kit on the standard model and other variants that have been used by Yamaha’s Ténéré factory team. Both versions have similarities like using a 690cc CP2 engine and exhaust from Akrapovič, though the Rally GYTR has a longer fork and removable subframe.

Botturi is coming off narrowly losing the Africa Eco Race to Aprilia’s Jacopo Cerruti by just 26 seconds. He had been leading until the final timed stage when plastic netting got stuck in his wheel and chain.

Paulin will be running his second rally raid but his first on two wheels, which should be familiar territory for him. He was a Yamaha factory rider in the FIM Motocross World Championship. finishing second in the 2015 MXGP standings with three wins, and won five straight Motocross des Nations for France from 2014 to 2018. After retiring from motocross in 2020 with nine MXGP victories, he became France’s MXoN team manager in 2023 and won that edition too.

In 2024, Paulin made his rally debut at the Africa Eco Race as the driver of Apache’s new APH-01 T3 car. Although new to the discipline, he won the overall for cars by nearly four hours.

The duo will be joined by riders from the Ténéré Spirit Experience, which is essentially a privateer program for Ténéré owners but receive factory support for rallies. Nicolas Charlier, Jérôme Clastre, Yann Duprey, Kevin Gallas, Bertrand Gavard, António Maio, and Frédéric Murat are among the TSE participants entered in the Carta Rallye. Charlier scored a surprising stage win at the Africa Eco Race en route to a tenth-place finish, while Maio is a W2RC and Dakar Rally veteran who raced a Yamaha Ténéré 700 World Raid for the first time at the Baja TT Escuderia Castelo Branco in March.

Held in Morocco, the Carta Rallye will take place on April 14–20.