While KAMAZ-master and Ural Motorsport will make their Taklimakan Rally debuts in May, their Belarusian rival won’t.

MAZ had planned to take part, but ultimately decided against it since they’re in the midst of upgrading their trucks to comply with FIA regulations. Although the team has been forbidden from FIA rallies since 2021 due to Western sanctions on the parent company, foreign non-FIA races like the Taklimakan still follow the same rulebook. The Russian Rally-Raid Championship, on the other hand, has separate rules.

As such, MAZ’s 2026 schedule is solely in the RAFRR and Silk Way Rally.

“This year, MAZ-SPORTauto will not be competing in the Taklimakan Rally. We plan to participate next year,” team leader Siarhei Viazovich told BUTIKAVTO.

Even with MAZ counting out, the Russian teams will head to China with two trucks apiece.

KAMAZ will field trucks for Bogdan Karimov and Almaz Akhmedov, the youngest drivers on the roster as the team wants to give them experience in races as long as the Silk Way. Karimov is the reigning RAFRR champion, while Akhmedov finished third overall in last year’s Silk Way.

Akhmedov and Karimov had also tested for KAMAZ at the Ulan Buh Desert in Inner Mongolia last November.

2025 Silk Way winner Anton Shibalov will serve as Akhmedov’s mechanic while Ivan Malkov remains his navigator. Karimov retains Dmitry Nikitin and Ilgiz Akhmetzyanov by his side.

“Training young athletes is a complex and multifaceted process that takes a lot of time,” KAMAZ head Eduard Nikolaev explained. “We share all our knowledge through daily work at our sports center and during training sessions. Several times a year, we have test sessions to help the kids acquire the skills necessary for rally raids. Of course, the best practice is real competition.

“The sands of China are very interesting and challenging, full of surprises and traps. It’s no wonder this race has earned the nickname ‘Dakar of the East’.”

Ural’s lead driver Yuri Naiman remains at his post with Aleksandr Shmelev as co-driver and Anton Kushnikov as mechanic. Ivan Korolev, who was Kushnikov’s mechanic in 2025, assumes driving duties of his own truck with Kirill Vorotnikov and Dmitry Bersenev joining him in the cockpit.

“The Taklimakan Rally is one of the toughest challenges in the world and the route is unpredictable. That is precisely why we have partially revised our crew lineup,” said Ural boss Viktor Yakovlev. “Each of the competitors here has hundreds of kilometers of off-road driving under their belt, along with late-night repairs and working at the absolute limit. I am confident that our team configuration will work and yield results.”

Featured image credit: Anton Elikov