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Ricky Brabec Leads Dakar

2026 Dakar Rally Results: Stage 12 – Decisive penultimate day win for Ricky Brabec

2026 Dakar Rally stage 12 results – Monster Energy Honda’s Ricky Brabec eyes a third Tuareg Trophy with decisive penultimate stage win ahead of Red Bull KTM’s Luciano Benavides setting up final day showdown.

Dakar 2026 Stage 12 summed up:

The best bit of the Dakar must be the bit where it all comes down to virtually nothing and the leading riders are giving it everything, surely?

This year’s race has had many ups and downs in the nearly 8000 kilometres ridden so far. The many twists and turns on this snaking, 311 kilometre timed special ran through very mixed terrain including dunes, wide-open desert, canyons and dried riverbeds and posed a tricky penultimate test.

Straight dogfight 

The two riders in it to win it started fourth and sixth today, meaning Luciano Benavides and Ricky Brabec both had lines in front to use as guides, hares to chase across the sand.

Starting from fourth place, overnight leader Benavides did everything he could. The KTM rider quickly overtook the three riders in front – teammate Edgar Canet, plus Honda pairing Adrien Van Beveren and Skyler Howes – which meant he’d gained nine minutes right there and the Argentine started gathering bonus time racing away out front.

After his bold gamble yesterday to stop on the stage in order to start further back today, Brabec was also gobbling up the riders in front but from two places and six minutes further back than Benavides.

Refuelling point hammers it home

At the refuelling points each day riders get a chance to calculate how they are doing in relation to who’s there, and who arrives behind them at what time intervals. For Benavides to find Brabec within two minutes of him at 223km and with under 100 to go, it was a reality time check.

Benavides had no choice but to go full gas to the finish, try to pull away and amass bonus time and not let Brabec catch him. The American had to knuckle down and keep chasing, knowing the Argentine was pushing. It was a 90km special test.

 

Crucial stage win for Brabec

The outcome was Benavides clocked 2:05 in bonuses which helped reduce the deficit but Brabec wins the stage by 3:43, proving the strategy to stop yesterday was a bold but smart one giving the two-time winner a 3:20 overall lead and a third Dakar title in sight.

Say what?

Ricky Brabec: “I don’t know if my strategy was all that good. I got to push all day but Luciano is riding really great. I tried all day to make up time and do my best job but he caught up to the leaders and was able to get bonus early on. I know he started six minutes ahead of me and I finish just behind him on the stage so I made up physical time. Tomorrow’s supposed to be easier they say and if I open and do a good job I should get a minute and a half of bonus time so we’ll see what happens.”

Luciano Benavides: “It was a tough day but I tried my best. I was pushing from the beginning and I passed Edgar quite early and from kilometre 150 was the one opening the stage. Not an easy stage to open so we lose a little bit of time but I’m happy I gave 100%. We keep the hope alive until the last kilometre.”

“It will not be decided until the last day”

Luciano Benavides said two days ago that it will come down to the last day and he was right. He looked deflated at the finish today, while Brabec looked a little cautious about any suggestion he had it in the bag.

Three minutes 43 seconds sounds easily enough to take the win, doesn’t it? It should be but the question marks are there: can Ricky lead the final 100km special test tomorrow without mistakes? Can he amass important bonus time in the process to counter any gain Benavides has? Can Benavides close down the three minutes he’ll have off the start in such a short distance?

The Argentine need look no further than his brother Kevin for inspiration to keep it pinned until the last ASS. K-Ben nicked the 2023 race win from Toby Price in the last stage after the Australian made a minor mistake. It can happen. May the best man win.

Hey, everyone else, where are you?

Why are there such huge gaps behind the top two on today’s stage? Answers ranged from making mistakes, crashing, wanting to make sure they reach the finish and nursing bikes but essentially it boils down to the leading two riders were prepared to risk more and are riding better – that’s why they are the two at the top.

The best of the rest today was Tosha Schareina finishing a rather large 13 minutes down on his teammate Brabec. We guess he has settled for third place on the podium by now.

Behind him Honda teammate Adrien Van Beveren claimed fourth, still aiming for a top five overall with Rally2 class best placed rider, Michael Docherty, fifth scratch today.

Skyler Howes took a career first Dakar stage win yesterday but was off the pace today, 24 minutes off in fact, which was surprising but not if you consider he roide half hte stage with oil leaking out his Honda engine: “There is no oil left in this engine so I am very, very surprised I made it to the finish line, it’s a miracle.”

The American takes fourth away from the injured Daniel Sanders by just 10 seconds. Meanwhile Sanders finished 15th, 35 minutes behind riding with a broken collarbone and sternum.

San Diego SX Preview

Stewart In for San Diego

Mookie is one tough guy!

Rockstar Energy Husqvarna Factory Racing's Malcolm Stewart has been cleared to line up for this Saturday's second round of the 2026 AMA Supercross Championship, following his involvement in a multi-bike incident on the opening lap of Anaheim 1's 450SX Main Event.
Upon further evaluation this week, it was confirmed that Stewart sustained a dislocated left shoulder and a fractured scapula, but will not require surgery.

The Florida native returned to riding alongside his Rockstar Energy Husqvarna teammates late this week and the decision has since been made to move forward with plans to compete aboard his Husqvarna FC 450 Factory Edition this weekend at Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego, California.

"I got the green light to go racing in San Diego," Stewart confirmed. "Unfortunately due to what happened at A1, I got my results back and there are some fractures that are in the scapular area of my shoulder blade. My dislocated shoulder went back in well though, so no surgery is needed, and everything from here on out is going to be pain-related. I'm a little sore, but at the end of the day, I feel good enough to go out there and give it a shot for San Diego and go race."

SX San Diego...Starts Matter!

Jorge Prado...The Real deal?

Top-qualifier Sexton has 'work to do' after mixed Anaheim 1

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Eighth-place finish after an eventful night in Kawasaki debut.

An eventful P8 result left Chase Sexton with ‘work to do’ following his Monster Energy Kawasaki debut at Anaheim 1, but there were positives to take from the 450SX opener.

Sexton’s opening round was highlighted by a 1m04.465s lap time in qualifying that placed him on top of the timesheets, over half a second clear of Eli Tomac – the rider who replaced him at Red Bull KTM Factory Racing.

A fast start in the second 450 heat race saw Sexton briefly take the lead, before a sequence of mishaps relegated him to fifth. A poor launch in the restarted main event – followed by further mistakes – left the 26-year-old in eighth position at the end of the night.

“The day started off well with earning the fastest qualifier,” Sexton recalled. “I felt really comfortable on the track and felt like I had the speed to contend up front. Unfortunately, I had a couple of mistakes during the heat race and main event that forced me to work my way through the field.

“It’s only the first round, and we have a good base to build off… We’ve got some work to do, but I know we’re capable of improving and putting up better results next week.”

Anaheim 1 marked a mixed first outing for Sexton and the storied Monster Energy Kawasaki team, currently 11 points in arrears of early championship leader Tomac heading into San Diego.

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Prado…”What a Surprize”

Jorge Prado shocked the world at the 2026 Monster Energy AMA Supercross season opener inside of Angel Stadium. It is no secret Prado’s first full season in America for the Monster Energy Kawasaki squad was nothing short of a disappointment. An injury at round three of supercross took the four-time FIM Motocross World Champion out of the series and unable to gain much needed experience inside the stadiums.

When he returned for the AMA Pro Motocross Championship, it was expected that the reigning MXGP champion would contend for wins and podiums, but as the summer went on that was not the case and things began to get weird under the Monster Kawi rig. Both parties were unhappy and Prado was heavily criticized by media and fans alike for how he went about the situation. He was eventually able to negotiate a way out of his three-year deal after just one year.

Prado signed a one-year deal with Red Bull KTM. He had spent 13 years of his career with the Austrian manufacturer and went all-in that the move back “home” would turn his American career around. Still, even he didn’t expect a supercross podium as quickly as round one. His strong start at Anaheim helps back up his decision in a huge way. At Anaheim he took the first 450 heat win of the season and then grabbed his first career podium on U.S. soil.

All day long, he was much improved from anything he had shown in his previous six supercross appearances. He was on the board in the first qualifying session, ending up fourth in the session, and sixth overall.

In the heat he got off to third place start behind his Red Bull KTM teammate Aaron Plessinger and the defending champion Cooper Webb. Prado pressured Webb early, to the point where Coop went defensive on Jorge and it caused Webb to run into Plessinger in dramatic fashion. Prado rode around the carnage and went on for the heat win, fending off a late charge from his other teammate, Eli Tomac.

After starting nearly last in the first main event gate drop, he took full advantage of the restart and ripped one of his patented holeshots. He surrendered the lead early to Tomac and second to Ken Roczen on lap three but controlled the final podium position from there on.

Prado rode flawlessly, keeping a comfortable gap over the battle behind him between Hunter Lawrence and Jason Anderson. Lawrence closed the gap late but not quite close enough to threaten for a pass. It was a story book performance for the Spaniard.

 

"This is really ahead of my expectations – the goal for this weekend was to just get through each session and do the best that I can.” -Jorge PradoAlign Media

"This is really ahead of my expectations – the goal for this weekend was to just get through each session and do the best that I can,” Prado said in a team statement. “I had great preparation leading into this year, but I am still so new to supercross. Getting the heat race win was awesome, but I am really happy with my main event and to be on the podium. I rode within my limits and still don't have a lot of words to describe my feelings right now, but all I can say is that hard work always pays off! It's great to start the season this way, so now we'll keep learning and look forward to a new opportunity next week."

Pre-season predictions were all over the place, but nobody expected a podium, including Jorge himself. In his TV podium interview admitted as much, saying, “This is unreal. I can’t even think about standing on the podium right now. Like this shouldn’t be now. It should be maybe at the end of the year or maybe next year, but not now at round one. Like I always say, hard work pays off and this off-season I’ve been putting in a lot of work.”

He expressed gratitude for the Red Bull KTM team saying, “I can’t thank enough, the whole Red Bull KTM Factory racing team for opening the doors again to me. This is my fourteenth season with them and hey, we belong to each other.”  

At the post-race scrum Prado talked about how the smooth transition back to KTM. “Once I jumped back on the KTM, I was like, man, this setup, it is basically good for me, like already from day one. This was a big advantage because I could put in a lot of laps this winter, just clicking laps, not even testing. This was a big for me; I put so many hours on the bike.”

 

“This is unreal. I can’t even think about standing on the podium right now. Like this shouldn’t be now. It should be maybe at the end of the year or maybe next year." - Jorge PradoAlign Media

Team Manager Ian Harrison has commented that Prado was just “burning up bikes” during the off-season, as he clicked off lap after lap, day after day.

Prado continued about how comfortable he feels back on the KTM.

“I had such a great feeling with the bike that I was feeling safe,” he explained. “And when you feel safe, you can always progress and go a little faster every time. I always felt safe when I was riding supercross, so I could always make progress.”

Prado’s performances are going to be one of the biggest things to watch as the season progresses. If he can keep this going, it would shape up to be one of the biggest bounce back stories in the history of the sport. His Anaheim 1 podium was as straight up as it gets. Was it just another one of those random and wild round one performances? Or is this actually just the beginning? If he was this good at round one, how high could his ceiling really be?

Dakar 2026 - Stage 7 Highlights

Luciano Benavides Strikes Back on Stage Seven as Daniel Sanders Extends Dakar Lead