“I’m confident we can go well in the Challenger class”

For his first Dakar outing in 2021 Marcelo Gastaldi set himself the ambitious goal of finishing first rookie aboard his Century Racing CR6. And he very nearly pulled it off, holding that much sought after position right up until the second leg of the marathon stage, when it all unravelled while the Brazilian was trying to overtake in the dust. The resulting crash necessitated the intervention of his rapid assistance and saw him limp into the bivouac at the end of the 8th stage a lowly 52nd. Still, for a man who has only been racing cars for 2 years it was a more than promising debut and one the man from Manaus intended to improve on in 2022. Aiming for a place in the top 15, Marcelo got himself a new co-driver in the form of young professional Brazilian navigator Carlos Sachs, but despite some promising stage results, events conspires to see them finally finish a disappointing 30th place overall. For 2023 the Brazilian duo gave the Dakar miss and instead took on and beat two BRX Hunters and 5 Toyota Overdrives (including Lucas Moraes) at the 2023 Rally dos Sertoes aboard their Century buggy -the first time a 2-wheel drive car has ever won South America’s toughest rally-raid. An investor in the Century Racing outfit, Marcelo was sorely tempted to enter the 2024 Dakar in their new 4x4 car but in the end decided that the project was too much in its infancy and has instead opted to entered the super competitive Challenger T3 class in the French MCE5 Taurus, with assistance by Team BBR.

“We were super proud with our 2023 Sertoes result and I’m confident that the 4x4 Century car will be highly competitive in the T1+ class, but it is early days. I tried out the MCE5 T3 at the Rallye du Maroc in October to see how I liked it and really enjoyed myself. We had a few problems during the race, so the result wasn’t what we were hoping for, but I’m confident we can go well in January in Saudi Arabia.”