“There are many top competitors in the SSV class”
En bref
M.S.
- Mindaugas Sidabras will be making his Dakar debut in the SSV class in 2026 alongside fellow Lithuanian Ernestas Česokas. They will be representing the Sidabras family team Izoton Sport in a Can-Am Maverick R acquired from South Racing.
- The 46-year-old has been a motorsport professional for the past 13 years, competing in autocross, rallycross and rally. He has enjoyed plenty of success on the domestic scene, winning three national championship titles in autocross and three more in rallycross.
- He and his wife Irina Sidabriene set up Izoton Sport to participate in national races and events like the Baltic Rallycross Championship. Their two sons followed in Mindaugas's footsteps and also compete in rallycross. Irina and one of the sons, Lukas, will be handling team media at Dakar 2026.
- Two years ago, Mindaugas made the switch to rally-raid and has been gradually building up to the Dakar. After doing Rallye Breslau, Baja Poland and Baja Morocco in 2025, he and Ernestas finished as the top rookies at the prestigious Rallye du Maroc, earning free entry to Dakar 2026 through the 'Road to Dakar' challenge.
- Mindaugas has attended the Dakar as a spectator on five occasions - once in Peru and four times in Saudi Arabia. He and his wife actually met Ernestas at Dakar 2020, when they were all watching the action together in the dunes!
- Before his first Dakar, Mindaugas has been picking up tips from some Lithuanian experts. He did Baja Poland alongside Arunas Gelazninkas, a two-time winner of the Original by Motul class, then travelled to the UAE in late November for some training in the dunes with national legend Antanas Juknevicius.
E.C.
- Ernestas Česokas is a talented co-driver who is also preparing for his first Dakar in 2026.
- The 34-year-old has been a fan of motorsport and the Dakar since he was a child, but he only started competing in traditional rally in 2024. And it was some debut season, as he and Darius Sukackas won the Lithuanian Rally Sprint championship in their rear-wheel-drive BMW! "We put in a lot of effort to be on top," he confessed. "It's one of the biggest achievements of my career."
- Ernestas was visiting Saudi Arabia for the first time when he went to watch the Dakar in 2020 and met Mindaugas and Irina in the dunes. They also ran into each other at the 2025 edition, where Ernestas was following the rally in a 4x4. "We have experience as spectators but not as competitors!" he jokes.
- Mindaugas and Ernestas won the Road to Dakar by finishing as the top rookies at the Rallye du Maroc 2025, but they had a big scare on the final stage, crashing within 500 metres of the finish line. "We jumped over the dunes, rolled six times, and lost around an hour trying to fix our car," Ernestas explains. "But we still managed to secure our place at the Dakar."
Ambition
M.S.: "We are excited but a bit nervous. I've been dreaming for many years about taking part in Dakar, and we will finally be there in 2026. I only started doing rally-raid two years ago. I realised that having gone past the age of 45, I needed another type of racing, a new direction. Rallycross is very fast for a very short time, whereas rally-raid is a marathon. Still, my 13 years of motorsport experience made it easier for me to understand as a discipline. I've been following the Dakar for many years. After the 2025 edition, I called Ernestas and asked if he would like to be my navigator at the Dakar, and he said yes. I think it only took him 10 minutes to decide (laughs). We started our journey as a team, doing Rallye Breslau and some other events. Then we won the rookie class and the Road to Dakar in Morocco, despite rolling over a dune about 500 metres from the finish line! I hope we are more or less prepared for our first Dakar. I checked the entry list and there are many top competitors in the SSV class. Johan Kristoffersson is coming this year, a multiple World Rallycross champion, and there are a lot of other famous names with plenty of experience. I think we will see how competitive we are after a couple of days. I don't want to say that we'll be fighting for the top positions. We need to run for a couple of stages and then we will see.”
E.C.: “I've been a fan of Dakar since I was a kid. I used to watch Lithuanians crossing the dunes in Africa on TV, and since then it's been a dream to participate. Now that dream is coming true. Antanas Juknevicius used to be one of my heroes, and a month ago he was our mentor in the dunes. In Morocco, Nasser Al Attiyah popped over and started chatting away like we'd known each other for years. It's crazy to go from being a fan to being part of Dakar. Mindaugas is a three-time champion in Lithuanian Rallycross, so he's a fast guy, we have good pace. We just need more experience in the dune stages, that's why we went to train with Antanas. Rally-raid requires a lot of effort to keep the pace all day long. We may need to slow down sometimes to keep things safe, and I will have to do a good job with navigation. It feels like the biggest challenge of my life, for sure. In Morocco we had a bit of pressure to win the rookie class and get that free entry. Now the pressure is even higher. You've got the whole country watching you, your friends see it on the news; “You're doing Dakar?!”. So I feel much more pressure, but I know I'm responsible for my result and I'll do my best. If I start a job, I want to finish it as best I can, and the same will be true at Dakar. Nobody wins this thing first time around. The first target for us is to reach the finish line. It's been a hell of a road to be here on the start line, and we're expecting much more over the next two weeks.”
