Daniel Sanders (KTM) knows: “You just have to go through” / Dakar Moto

Daniel Sanders has been leading the overall standings since the first day of Dakar 2025 and it looks like the KTM factory rider will be able to maintain this position until the end. Because on stage 10, his pursuers had perhaps the last chance to make up time for the Australian, but none of his direct rivals for the Dakar victory crossed the finish line ahead of him – with Sanders only finishing in twelfth place, 8 minutes :22 back!

Sanders knows that under normal circumstances his first Dakar victory cannot be taken away from him. “Thursday is about survival and finishing,” insisted the 30-year-old. “I hope a few faster people will come from behind to open the way. But for sure, I think we will get along well. We feel good, but even the first 40, 50 kilometers they felt really hard on the sand because the sand here is completely different than before. I felt really good to ride and I opened up a little bit today and then yeah, it felt good.”

Stage 11 takes place again in the Empty Quarter. On the front grid position you can easily lose a lot of time with a navigation error, but for Sanders this will be less of a problem with the eleven drivers starting in front of him.

Sanders enters the final two days of the 47th Dakar with a 16-minute lead over Honda driver Tosha Schareina. He would have preferred a slightly bigger river.

“If I had driven well, I would have had a good position on Tuesday – unfortunately I wasn’t as good as I wanted in the test,” admits the KTM star. “But this is a rally, you can never have a perfect race unless you do a motocross stage or at least something very short and simple. You always go for perfection, that’s the goal. It would be great if you could achieve it one day.”