Off-road racer Sara Price celebrates breakthrough at Dakar Rally

Sara Price slipped from her off-road vehicle at the Dakar Rally, after a rigorous race through the dust and fiendish dunes of Saudi Arabia, and had to verify with certainty that she had made event history of endurance.

“I don’t think an American has ever won a stage, have you?” she asked.

Price was right: the 31-year-old Californian this week became the first American female driver and the third woman to win a stage of the Dakar.

Not bad for a Dakar rookie.

Price has built his career on far-flung adventures around the world. She is a former X Games medalist, competed in an electric racing series for Daytona 500 and Chip Ganassi, owner of the Indianapolis 500 team, was a national dirt bike champion and went to Hollywood for a while , earning credits as a stunt pilot, most notably in “Jumanji.” : The next level.

But racing in Dakar?

The off-road race spanning thousands of kilometers, held this year for up to 15 days through the jagged rocks and canyons of Saudi territory, had been a dream for Price since 2015.

“This year, I finally said, you know what, I’m going,” Price told the Associated Press. “If it requires spending every ounce of money I have in my savings account, I'm going to make it happen. I don't want to wait any longer. I was trying to find sponsors and funding to make this happen, I will do it .' has been saying heavily for the last five years, and it just hasn't happened. It's a very expensive race to make.

Price invested her own money, held fundraisers in Canyon Lake, Calif., where she grew up, to raise about $500,000, and “took a leap of faith” to reach Dakar. She prepared for the Dakar in October with a second place overall in the World Rally Raid Championship in Morocco, also becoming the first American to score a stage victory in the race more commonly known as Morocco Rally.

“We really didn't expect to do as well as we did, but we ended up winning a few stages and making some history there,” Price said. “It was huge, especially being at the forefront for our country. All the little girls looking at me and saying, 'Hey, I can do that too,' that's pretty cool.”

Price was just getting started.

She arrived in Saudi Arabia as a private rider with a group consisting of her mechanic, her navigator, her best friend and her boyfriend, fellow rider Ricky Brabec, who in 2020 became the first American to win the motorcycle division in the Dakar. just run, but even drive in a country that only lifted the driving ban for women in 2018. The ban had relegated women to the back seat, limiting when and how they moved.

For nearly three decades, Saudi women and the men who support them have unreservedly demanded that women have the right to drive. They risked arrest for defying the ban while women in other Muslim countries drove freely.

Take a look this week at Al-Ula, Saudi Arabia, where Price pilots a Can-Am Maverick X3 UTV 230 miles to a stage victory in the T4 (production models) class.

“In the areas I have been to in Saudi Arabia, I have never felt uncomfortable,” she said. “There are times when I'm a little cautious, but it's all about being smart. Common sense. You have to respect other cultures and who they are. Other people are brought up 'a different way, and I respect I come to their country knowing what I can do to make them feel comfortable as well as to be comfortable myself.

She has little time to play tourist, although she enjoyed a trip before Dakar to Elephant Rock, a sandstone formation in Saudi Arabia.

Originally a circuit from Paris to Dakar, Senegal, the race has been held across Saudi Arabia since 2020. Price, with the help of navigator Jeremy Gray, has since joined Jutta Kleinschmidt and Cristina Gutiérrez as female Dakar winners .

“If you go somewhere else and race in the world, everyone knows the Dakar Rally,” Price said. “They know the Dakar is the pinnacle of off-roading. Everyone knows the riders. But if you come to America, not everyone really knows it or knows the riders. It's not as intense than the rest of the Dakar. world.”

Perhaps Price's stage victory – with two stages remaining, the next two days are crucial to clinching a victory or finishing on the podium – can open the eyes of fans and sponsors in the American racing world.

“My whole life has been surrounded by racing,” she said. “I've raced from two to four wheels, in many different disciplines. This is the pinnacle for me.”