2026 Desafio Ruta 40: “Argentina quickly reminds you that distance doesn’t tell the full story.” – Stage 2 Stock winner Baciuska

Excluding the FIM-only Prologue, Stage 2 had the shortest Selective Section of the Desafío Ruta 40 at just 128 kilometers. For comparison, the other four stages all exceed 320 km while Stage 3 on Wednesday is the longst at 409 km.

It was originally going to be much longer with a 334-km special, which was eventually whittled down because of objections by indigenous groups to the use of their land for the second special. That was then converted into liaisons to get to the new bivouac in San Rafael. Even then, don’t let the short SS fool you because Tuesday was still a grind.

“Argentina quickly reminds you that distance doesn’t tell the full story,” said Rokas Baciuška. He pointed out that despite the length, he spent nearly two hours on the special en route to winning for Stock.

“Narrow tracks, fesh-fesh dust, sand and places where you need commitment, otherwise you can easily get stuck. We’re now P1 overall in Stock, but only by 32 seconds, which means nothing as more than a thousand kilometers still to go in three days.”

Baciuška cleared teammate Stéphane Peterhansel for the Stock win by just 42 seconds to take the overall lead by 0:32.

Ricky Brabec knew his day was going to be long from the start when the odometer glitched out, dropping him to tenth. He managed to recover and finish fourth, though he still trails Daniel Sanders by 12:35.

Teammate Skyler Howes also ran into glitches on his tablet that knocked him down to ninth. Besides the technical issues, the shrubbery also took a toll on his hands.

“[They’re] like pokey trees,” he remarked. “I got some thorns stuck in my arm. It’s kind of like acupuncture, so if I move just right then I can’t use my fingers. That was exciting.”

José Ignacio Cornejo had a rough day that cratered with a crash at the start. He finished 19th overall and last in RallyGP, but at least he isn’t at the bottom in the overall. A rock punctured Ryan Nariño’s rear tire and the bib mousse came apart 70 kilometers into the road section, forcing him to slow down from 115 km/h to 70 km/h before stopping at KM 110 to insert an inner tube. Another puncture then forced Nariño to stop until a spare arrived.

“The silt was the worst in my life,” said Nariño. “I couldn’t keep the front end straight. I rode mote off the course on the side than on the course. It was terrible.

“Now I’m so happy for some pavement.”

While Nasser Al-Attiyah winning the stage for FIA isn’t a surprise, Kevin Benavides was the big winner. Although new to the Ultimate class, the former Dakar bike champ finished just 18 seconds behind Al-Attiyah while edging out Saood Variawa by three seconds.

João Ferreira was fourth to take the overall lead from Eryk Goczał, who had two punctures at KM 12 then lost fourth gear at halfway. While Goczał was relegated to 23rd in Ultimate for the day and fell to ninth overall, he feels the damage is manageable at the current.

“The time loss isn’t very big, and tomorrow we’ll have a good starting position,” he explained. “This could be a good moment to attack.

“It’s not as bad as it could have been. It’s a pity about the time lost, but it is what it is. The rally is still long.”

RallyGP and Rally2 were respectively the KTM and Honda shows. In the former, Daniel Sanders led a 1–2 as he cleared teammates Luciano Benavides by five minutes. The latter was a Monster Energy HRC podium sweep led by Preston Campbell with Martim Ventura and Bruno Crivilin 2:49 and 2:50 back. Campbell is only the second American to win a Rally2 stage in the W2RC era after Mason Klein’s 17.

Klein empathized with Nariño’s struggles in the silt.

“Saudi pitch-black silt ruts, I crashed the bike,” Klein recalled from racing Dakar. “Disappeared, then I fell in the rut again walking and looking for the bike.”

Stage winners

FIA

Class	Overall	Number	Driver	Team	Total Time
Ultimate	1	299	Nasser Al-Attiyah	Dacia Sandriders	1:45:42
Challenger	13	301	Alexandre Pinto	Old Friends Rally Team	1:50:54
SSV	23	402	Jeremías González Ferioli	Can-Am Factory Team	1:55:49
Stock	27	502	Rokas Baciuška	Defender Rally	1:58:49

FIM

Class	Overall	Number	Rider	Team	Total Time
RallyGP	1	1	Daniel Sanders	Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	1:39:43
Rally2	7	85	Preston Campbell	Monster Energy Honda HRC	1:47:05
Rally3	40	79	Murun Purevdorj	Xraids Experience	2:30:17
Quad	30	171	Antanas Kanopkinas	CFMOTO Thunder Racing Team	2:16:48

Open

Class	Overall	Number	Driver	Team	Total Time
T1	14	701	Ramón Nuñez	Dakar Team	3:40:00
T3	7	711	Emilio Rosselot	Rosselot Rally Team	2:27:49
T4	1	753	Thiago Fraga	Dango Racing	2:04:29

Overall leaders

FIA

Class	Overall	Number	Driver	Team	Total Time
Ultimate	1	240	João Ferreira	Toyota Gazoo Racing South Africa	5:22:32
Challenger	15	301	Alexandre Pinto	Old Friends Rally Team	5:10:55
SSV	20	402	Jeremías González Ferioli	Can-Am Factory Team	5:52:35
Stock	25	502	Rokas Baciuška	Defender Rally	6:02:06

FIM

Class	Overall	Number	Rider	Team	Total Time
RallyGP	1	1	Daniel Sanders	Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	5:20:11
Rally2	9	85	Preston Campbell	Monster Energy Honda HRC	5:46:04
Rally3	36	79	Murun Purevdorj	Xraids Experience	7:47:58
Quad	35	177	Lucas Dominguez	LD Racing Team	7:46:35