Puck Klaassen entered the Rallye du Maroc as the W2RC leader in Challenger, hoping to build upon her nine-point advantage over Alexandre Pinto.

Unfortunately, her title pursuit was literally turned upside down. On the very first stage, Klaassen hit a rut and flipped, ending her rally already.

“I knew this race was always going to be dangerous in terms of things that could catch you out and I was extra alert for these kind of surprises. But this one got us,” said Klaassen. “The racing line was off the roadbook so I didn’t expect the ditch at all. Saw it in the last second but it was too late.

“Coming into this race leading the championship and crashing out on Stage 1 is tough, especially as we never wanted to take any unnecessary risks and were driving within our limits. It’s disappointing for us and the team but that’s racing.”

With Klaassen out of the picture, the door to the championship lead blew right off its hinges for Pinto. He won all but one stage and easily cruised to the victory, his second of the season after the Rally-Raid Portugal. Only Rui Carneiro and Manuel Andújar finished within an hour of Pinto, who now leads the Challenger standings with 157 points to Klaassen’s 113.

A 47-point gap with one race to go isn’t insurmountable, but will be very difficult to make up. As it stands, Pinto is in good position for his second consecutive title after topping SSV in 2025.

Willem Avenant, a friend of 131 Off-Road who usually races a bike, made his W2RC navigating debut as Philip McVay’s co-driver. They stalled on a dune during the first stage, then were going through a riverbed 20 kilometers until their Taurus hit a series of compressions and flipped twice. The damage sidelined them for Stage 2 as they made repairs before rejoining the day after with a 20-minute penalty for swapping the engine. The #323 also got penalized because of their tracker not working and misregistering checkpoints that they allegedly missed. The rear brakes on McVay’s car went out 60 kilometers into Stage 4 as well.

Despite everyhing, the duo made it to the end as the last finisher in Challenger.

Paul Spierings, who came to help Klaassen after her crash, prevented Pinto from sweeping the stages as he beat him for the Stage 2 win by 4:26. However, Spierings himself flipped after overshooting a hole in Stage 4. He was able to get the damage fixed and rejoin the race, but finished outside the top ten. His teammate Pál Lónyai bowed out due to medical issues.

Daniel Schröder and Raúl Delgado both switched to the Open class after retiring. Adam Kuś didn’t have the same benefit as his engine expired.

Results

Finish	Overall	Number	Driver	Navigator	Team	Total Time	Margin
1	15	301	Alexandre Pinto	Bernardo Oliveira	Odyssey Academy by BBR	18:03:18	Leader
2	23	306	Rui Carneiro	Fausto Mota	RC Motorsport	18:55:03	+ 51:45
3	24	308	Manuel Andújar	Andrés Frini	7240 Rally Team	19:00:34	+ 57:16
4	27	326	Loïc Bonnevie*	Kevin Delcros	BBR Motorsport	19:32:32	+ 1:29:14
5	29	307	Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari	Xavier Panseri	QMMF Team	19:37:02	+ 1:33:44
6	31	312	Khalifa Al-Attiyah*	Max Delfino	QMMF Team by Nasser Racing	19:41:25	+ 1:38:07
7	39	319	Benjamin Favre*	Thibaud Darroux	MMP Competition	21:05:28	+ 3:02:10
8	43	309	Roger Grouwels*	Rudolf Meijer	QFF Racing	21:35:40	+ 3:32:22
9	47	318	Martin Benko*	Jiri Kalat	Norwit Racing	22:23:53	+ 4:20:35
10	49	327	Edward Ruszczyc*	Krzysztof Kubiś	RedFox	22:49:57	+ 4:46:39
11	54	315	Jedidia Favre*	Antoine Lecourbe	MMP Compétition	24:53:27	+ 6:50:09
12	68	304	Paul Spierings	Kala Senders	Rebellion Spierings	3905:31	+ 21:02:13
13	71	310	Lex Peters*	Arjan van Tiel	G Rally Team	40:35:45	+ 22;32:27
14	72	330	Hugues Lacam*	Delphine Delfino	MMP Compétition	41:04:58	+ 23:01:40
15	81	329	Kevin Jimenez*	Stéphane Duplé	MMP Compétition	61:36:24	+ 43:33:06
16	83	325	Pavel Andreev*	Dmitry Pavlov	BBR Motorsport	74:47:42	+ 56:44:24
17	84	323	Philip McVay*	Willem Avenant	Werace Motorsport Services Escudería Motor Terrassa	80:25:33	+ 62:22:15
DNF	DNF	302	Puck Klaassen	Augusto Sanz	KTM X-Bow Lab Team	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	311	Mohammed Al-Marri*	Pierre Delorme	QMMF Team by Nasser Racing	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	314	Daniel Schröder ^	Leonard Cremer	BBR Motorsport	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	316	Rodrigo Varela*	Carlos Sachs	BBR Motorsport	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	317	Adam Kuś*	Maciej Giemza	Akpol Recycling Rally Team	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	321	Gérald Blanco*	Gaidella Thomas	BTR	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	322	Pál Lónyai*	Alexey Kuzmich	Rebellion Spierings	DNF	N/A
DNF	DNF	324	Raúl Delgado* ^	José Luis Rosa	Herrador Factory Team	DNF	N/A

Stage winners

Stage	Overall	Driver	Time
Stage 1	25	Alexandre Pinto	2:55:57
Stage 2	23	Paul Spierings	3:50:34
Stage 3	16	Alexandre Pinto	4:09:07
Stage 4	26	Alexandre Pinto	3:30:02
Stage 5	20	Alexandre Pinto	3:33:12

Featured image credit: Paulo Maria / DPPI / ASO