The World Rally-Raid Championship in Challenger came down to a duel between reigning champ Nicolás Cavigliasso and Pau Navarro, who entered the Rallye du Maroc separated by 29 points. While not the biggest gap, Navarro still faced an uphill battle if he wanted to leapfrog Cavigliasso.

Although he managed to beat his rival for the RdM overall win, Cavigliasso finished right behind him to mitigate the damage dealt to just three points.

Neither driver won a stage in Morocco, meaning they had to rack up stage points each day (for reference, a stage winner gets five points, second gets four, and so on) in addition to the end-of-race allocation. Cavigliasso was fourth in Stage 1 to Navarro’s fifth after the latter got lost and struggled to adapt to his suspension setup. Once the latter was fixed, Navarro netted three points in Stage 2 while Cavigliasso was seventh and failed to score any.

After a 4–5 for Cavigliasso and Navarro in Stage 3, they moved up to second and first in the overall due to leaders Yasir Seaidan and Charles Munster experiencing mchanical issues. Navarro grew his lead over Cavigliasso with his sixth to Cavigliasso’s seventh in Stage 4.

Cavigliasso finished fourth on the final day and two minutes ahead of Navarro, but it wasn’t enough to beat Navarro for the overall. However, that matters little to Cavigliasso as his runner-up was more than good to secure his second consecutive Challenger title.

His wife Valentina Pertegarini had won the navigators’ title a round early.

While coming up short, Navarro still scored his maiden W2RC win in the Challenger class.

“We stuck to the strategy, maintaining a steady pace without breaking down or getting lost,” said Navarro.

Puck Klaassen rounded out the overall podium after scoring a stage win in Stage 2. She and Dania Akeel’s two stage victories made Challenger the first category in which multiple women won a stage in a given rally. Unlike Klaassen, Akeel finished 13th overall after getting lost in the dunes early on.

Kevin Benavides’ return to the W2RC as a driver didn’t quite go as hoped. Trading in his bike for a Taurus, he was in an early hole due to speeding penalties before mehcanical issues took him out of contention. Despite the issues, he finished as high as third in Stage 5.

Results

Finish	Overall	Number	Driver	Navigator	Team	Class	Total Time	Margin
1	18	303	Pau Navarro	Jan Rosa	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	17:21:14	Leader
2	19	301	Nicolás Cavigliasso	Valentina Pertegarini	Vertical Motor Sport Team	T3.1	17:21:43	+ 00:29
3	21	302	Puck Klaassen	Augusto Sanz	G Rally Team	T3.1	17:36:22	+ 15:08
4	22	317	Paul Spierings*	Jan Pieter van der Stelt	Rebellion Spierings	T3.1	18:39:13	+ 18:13
5	28	329	Luis Gonçalves*	Hugo Magalhães	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	19:18:34	+ 1:17:59
6	31	315	Kees Koolen*	Jurgen van den Goorbergh	G Rally Team	T3.1	19:18:34	+ 1:57:20
7	36	320	Alexandre Giroud*	Armelle Henry	Rebellion Spierings	T3.1	19:31:37	+ 2:10:23
8	42	327	Òscar Ral*	Pol Ros	Vertical Motor Sport Team	T3.1	20:54:18	+ 3:33:04
9	44	318	Aurélien Bouchet*	Elisa Huguenin	AB Concept / BTR	T3.1	22:21:41	+ 5:00;27
10	51	324	Pál Lónyai*	Alexey Kuzmich	G Rally Team	T3.1	24:28:06	+ 7:06:52
11	54	304	Dania Akeel	Carlos Sachs	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	31:40:30	+ 14:19:16
12	55	316	Emilio Fernandez*	Ion del Cid	Raceseven	T3.1	32:43:00	+ 15:21:46
13	57	308	Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari	Stéphane Duplé	QMMF Racing Team by Nasser Racing	T3.1	33:44:51	+ 16:23:37
14	58	332	Louis Baudrand*	Valentin Sarreaud	Bernard Munster Autosport / Apache Automotive	T3.U	34:05:25	+ 16:44:11
15	63	305	Yasir Seaidan	Michaël Metge	Race World / MMP Compétition	T3.1	36:07:48	+ 18:46:34
16	65	312	Jayden Els*	Johannes Swemmer	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	36:20:25	+ 18:59:11
17	67	314	Charles Munster*	Xavier Panseri	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	37:11:09	+ 19:49:55
18	71	331	Maha Al-Hamali*	Xavier Flick	MMP Compétition	T3.1	42:06:10	+ 24:44:56
19	72	328	Rine Streppel*	Lisette Bakker	Arcane Racing	T3.1	44:06:29	+ 26:45:15
20	79	347	Kevin Benavides*	Lisandro Sisterna	BBR Motorsport	T3.1	57:14:48	+ 39:53:34
DNF	DNF	307	Khalifa Al-Attiyah	Max Delfino	QMMF Racing Team by Nasser Racing	T3.1	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	321	Rui Carneiro	Ola Fløene	G Rally Team	T3.1	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	322	Pablo Copetti*	Carlos Verza	MMP Compétition	T3.1	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	325	Lex Peters*	Mark Salomons	Arcane Racing	T3.1	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	330	Martin Benko*	Marek Sýkora	Norwit Racing	T3.1	DNF	N/A

Stage winners

Stage	Overall	Driver	Time
Prologue	19	Jayden Els*	12:49.0
Stage 1	24	Yasir Seaidan	3:09:46
Stage 2	17	Puck Klaassen	3:42:42
Stage 3	20	Dania Akeel	3:54:50
Stage 4	24	Dania Akeel	2:58:38
Stage 5	17	Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari	2:58:42
Power Stage	14	Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari	20:52

W2RC

Drivers

Rank	Driver	Points	Margin
1	Nicolás Cavigliasso	206	Leader
2	Pau Navarro	180	– 26
3	Dania Akeel	154	– 52
4	Gonçalo Guerreiro	113	– 93
5	Yasir Seaidan	99	– 107
6	Adam Kuś	73	– 133
7	Puck Klaassen	71	– 135
8	Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari	69	– 137
9	Khalifa Al-Attiyah	54	– 152
10	David Zille	51	– 155
11	Corbin Leaverton	39	– 167
12	Pim Klaassen	38	– 168
13	Pedro Gonçalves	36	– 170
T-14	Khalid Al-Jafla	18	– 188
T-14	Mário Franco	18	– 188
16	Eduard Pons	17	– 189
17	Rui Carneiro	3	– 203
18	Mattias Ekström	1	– 205

Navigators

Rank	Navigator	Points	Margin
1	Valentina Pertegarini	206	Leader
T-2	Stéphane Duplé	130	– 76
T-2	Jan Rosa i Viñas	130	– 76
4	Carlos Sachs	117	– 89
5	Bruno Jacomy	104	– 102
6	Michaël Metge	99	– 107
7	Dmytro Tsyro	73	– 133
8	Sebastian Cesana	51	– 155
9	Lisandro Sisterna	50	– 156
10	Charan Moore	40	– 166
11	Taye Perry	39	– 167
12	Mark Laan	38	– 168
13	Nasser Al-Kuwari	37	– 169
14	Rui Franco	32	– 174
15	Augusto Sanz	31	– 175
16	Cadu Sachs	28	– 178
17	Hugo Magalhães	21	– 185
18	Andrei Rudnitski	18	– 188
19	Jaume Betriu	17	– 189
T-20	Max Delfino	2	– 204
T-20	Ola Fløene	2	– 204
T-22	Emil Bergkvist	1	– 205
T-22	David Megre	1	– 205
T-22	João Miranda	1	– 205

Featured image credit: Julien Delfosse / DPPI / ASO