The Open class at the Rallye du Maroc is for vehicles that don’t comply with FIA regulations and drivers who would like to run the race outside of the federation’s jurisdiction. The latter comes in handy for FIA drivers who retired from multiple stages, which would ordinarily classify them as a DNF, but were able to rejoin the race later down the road.

Laia Sanz was the most high-profile driver to pull this. Her Ebro was taken out by a steering pump failure in Stage 3 followed by a broken belt tensioner the next day. Still, she was permitted to run the last day by moving from Ultimate to Open. She ended up posting the fastest time for the stage, clearing Daniel Schröder by 17:25.

Schröder also migrated from the FIA side. He started the rally in Challenger with the new Odyssey CR-X by Century Racing and BBR Motorsport, but was in Open by Stage 3. He topped Stages 3 and 4.

In official race documentation, both drivers are deemed to have run the entire rally in Open as well as FIA. This means Sanz is listed as having also won the first two stages for Open despite being an FIA driver at the time; her Stage 1 time ranked her 22nd in Ultimate while she was 23rd for Stage 2.

Otherwise, Christian Lavieille was the fastest for Stages 1 and 2 among those who started in Open.

Lavieille rejoined Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body in July, returning to the team with whom he won the Dakar Rally’s T2 class three times. He’s part of a reshoring by Toyota Auto Body to counter Defender Rally in the Stock category, with Yasir Seaidan competing in said class for Morocco while Lavieille took part as an Open driver.

TAB usually does the Rallye du Maroc in non-FIA divisions because the looser rules let the team experiment with different approaches sans the pressure of racing against other teams. In 2025, Akira Miura and Ronald Basso were part of the Experimental Stock category.

Tires were the only question mark that Lavieille faced throughout the week. Stage 1 went fairly smoothly save for a delay caused by the truck in front of him suffering a flat tire, while he had to adjust the tire pressure at times. He then a slight puncture in Stage 2 before the shortened Stage 3 proceeded without issue. His Land Cruiser got stuck at various times in Stage 4, so he had to deflate and reinflate the tires accordingly; he also stopped to help a rider who was dealing with hypoglycemia.

While topping Open is certainly nice, the RdM was more like an advanced test session for the team ahead of the 2027 Dakar.

“It’s not hugely significant. Winning the FIA class is what really matters,” Lavieille said. “But it’s still a great reward for the whole team and for Toyo too, who supplied excellent tires, because we managed to avoid punctures the entire week. That’s a significant achievement considering we drove over some rocky sections.

“Now, it’s time to focus on Dakar.”

Results

Auto

Finish	Overall	Number	Driver	Navigator	Team	Total Time	Margin
1	1	701	Christian Lavieille	Valentin Sarreaud	Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body	19:57:34	Leader
2	2	214	Laia Sanz*	Maurizio Gerini	Ebro Audax Motorsport	24:46:37	+ 4:49:03
3	5	314	Daniel Schröder*	Leonard Cremer	BBR Motorsport	58:13:37	+ 48:16:03

SSV

Finish	Overall	Number	Driver	Navigator	Team	Total Time	Margin
1	3	721	Brahim Ettaiek	Said Ahnana	BE Racing	28:00:15	Leader
2	4	722	Ján Hnidka	Marek Sýkora	JSK Racing	42:20:10	+ 14:19:55
3	6	724	Raúl Delgado*	José Luis Rosa	Herrador Factory Team	63:50:22	+ 35:50:07
DNF	DNF	726	Gérald Blanco*	Gaidella Thomas	BTR	DNF	N/A

Stage winners

Stage	Overall	Auto SSV	Time
Stage 1	1 3	Laia Sanz Gérald Blanco	3:00:13 5:14:25
Stage 2	1 3	Laia Sanz Ján Hnidka	3:55:56 5:18:10
Stage 3	1 2	Daniel Schröder Ján Hnidka	4:27:18 4:54:57
Stage 4	1 2	Daniel Schröder Ján Hnidka	3:38:06 3:47:35
Stage 5	1 3	Laia Sanz Ján Hnidka	1:50:48 2:19:28

Featured image credit: Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body