Honda’s Schareina wins Stage 5, finishes 1st overall

With a victory on Friday at the final Stage 5 of this week’s Rallye du Maroc, Round 5 of the 2025 FIM World Rally-Raid Championship, Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally’s Tosha Schareina secured the overall event victory, topping KTM’s Daniel Sanders by 3:12 over nearly 16 hours of racing in and around Morocco’s famed Merzouga desert. And joining Schareina on the overall Rallye du Maroc premier RallyGP class podium was his Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally teammate, Ricky Brabec, who placed 3^rd on today’s Stage 5 and 3^rd overall on the week.

For the WRRC season, Schareina and Brabec would also stand on the final podium, in 2^nd and 3^rd places, respectively. Also making the podium for Monster Energy, in the support Rally2 division, was Hero Motorsports, fueled by Monster Energy’s Tobias Ebster, who placed 2^nd overall on the season (4^th at Morocco).

With Sanders having won the previous four WRRC rounds heading into Morocco, certainly one of the main goals for both the Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally and Hero Motorsports, fueled by Monster Energy, teams was to derail the efforts by KTM to sweep the entire season. And at the end it’d be “Mission Accomplished” as Schareina stood tall as the fastest motorcycle rally racer in Morocco this week.

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“I’m very happy. First of all, for the team, because we took the victory, finally, at the last round of the World Championships,” said Schareina. “1^st and 3^rd on the week. A great lead up to the Dakar (’26), which is the most important, as you know. (I was) 2^nd overall in the World Championships, so what a better way to finish the season than with a victory in Morocco.

“We needed that and we went for it – and we won it. That is motivation for everybody for Dakar.”

For Brabec, the hard-fought 3^rd place run in the sands of Morocco was a reward for the big picture – the ominous ’26 Dakar Rally that’s just a couple months away.

“Happy to be healthy. Happy to make it here to the finish line, that’s the main goal,” said Brabec, who’d failed to finish his previous two efforts at Rallye du Maroc.

“We’re going to go home healthy and start preparing for Dakar.”

Also, spilling over from Thursday and into Friday at Rallye du Maroc was the improbable story of Monster Energy’s Jose “Nacho” Cornejo (Hero Motorsports). On Thursday, Cornejo won Stage 4. Then, in the hours following the race, the FIM decided to award the win to Schareina, based off a malfunctioning navigational tablet. Then, early Friday morning, the FIM changed its mind – again – and awarded the Stage 4 victory back to Cornejo, opting to credit Schareina 52 seconds (instead of the 1:55 they gave him on Thursday, which put him in the Stage 4 lead over Cornejo).

“It was a pretty special, and crazy day,” said Cornejo, who would place 6^th overall on the season in RallyGP. “I won the stage, then they gave it back to Tosha because of some navigational problems. They gave him the (gold) medal, and he (Schareina) made a really nice gesture and gave the medal to me. And they the (FIM) took back some of the time they credited him, so I ended up actually winning the stage in the middle of the night (laughter).”

Rounding out the Stage 5 and overall Rallye du Maroc scoring for Monster Energy, with a top ten for Monster Energy were a number of racers, including Adrien Van Beveren (Honda HRC Rally) in 4^th position for RallyGP. AVB also finished a very respectable 4^th overall on the week, despite riding injured following a crash at the last WRRC round in Portugal. Cornejo, as mentioned, would finish the season in 6^th position overall, despite having crashed out of the Rallye du Maroc on the final day. Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally’s Skyler Howes, who also crashed earlier in the week and was unable to finish, placed 7^th on the season, while defending WRRC RallyGP class champion, Ross Branch (Hero Motorsports, fueled by Monster Energy) dealt with some bad luck all year and rounded out the top ten overall on the season in 9^th position.

Notes:

On today’s final Stage 5 of the Rallye du Maroc, Schareina was on the main jet from the get go, chasing, catching and passing leader (and first bike out) Cornejo before the first time check. This earner Schareina some valuable Bonus Points which would insure his 42-second victory over Sanders.
“We’ve reached the end of the Rallye du Maroc, the final race of the year. We were missing a victory and this one with Tosha comes at a perfect time.” – Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally general manager Ruben Faria
“It’s a good rally. Everyone wants to win, of course, but the competition’s really strong right now. People are swinging off the back and going wide open. Couple things to work on for the Dakar, but overall I’m happy to be at the finish line. And happy to be in one piece.” – Brabec on du Maroc.
“I came here for a different challenge. I knew I would suffer a little bit. I’m happy I held up. My body is still stiff, but I unlocked some key points and finished strong towards my Dakar preparation and Dakar goal. So, yeah, this is why we came. (I’m) really happy to make it to the finish. Now we have two months of hard work and I can’t wait for Dakar.” – Van Beveren
Van Beveren’s impressive run at a top five position at Rallye du Maroc was highlighted by top five finishes across the board – Stages 1-5.
“That’s the end of the 2025 season. It was an up and down season for us, results wise. But, really positive on the side that we were able to do so much with the bike and make some steps as a team and I’m really, really happy about that. Obviously, the No. 1 plate was a dream come true for me and I loved running the No. 1 plate all year. Unfortunately, we had some bad luck. But it is what it is. Just makes us want to work that much harder and be even more motivated for next year.” – Branch
“For the whole rally season, it was pretty amazing. Coming in as a privateer, changing bike and manufacturer in the middle of the season, and delivering a 2^nd place in the World Championship is simply amazing. I can’t thank everyone from Hero and Monster Energy enough.” Keep going and keep growing. Dakar is just around the corner.” – Ebster
The 2026 FIM World Rally-Raid Championship will cover four continents, including South America, as the WRRC returns to Argentina for the Desafio Ruta 40

WRRC Rallye du Maroc

Stage 5 (Place/Name/Team/Time) RallyGP class

1^st – Schareina (Monster Energy/Honda), + 2:24:35

3^rd – Brabec (Monster Energy/Honda), + 1:53

5^th – Van Beveren (Monster Energy/Honda), + 7:15

10^th – Branch (Monster Energy/Hero), + 9:37

Overall (through 5 of 5 stages)

1^st – Schareina (Monster Energy/Honda), 15:51:34

2^nd – Sanders (KTM), + 3:12

3^rd – Brabec (Monster Energy/Honda), + 9:37

4^th – Van Beveren (Monster Energy/Honda), + 30:16

6^th – Cornejo (Monster Energy/Hero), + 44:36

RallyGP 2 class

2^nd – Ebster (Monster Energy/Hero), + 9:04 (4^th overall, + 1:11:41)

Monster Energy WRRC Motorcycle GP class season standings (after 5 of 5 rounds)

Place/Name/Team

2^nd – Schareina (Monster Energy/Honda), 91 points

3^rd – Brabec (Monster Energy/Honda), 82 points

5^th – Van Beveren (Monster Energy/Honda), 61 points

6^th – Cornejo (Hero/Monster Energy), 55

7^th – Howes (Monster Energy/Honda), 46 points

9^th – Branch (Hero/Monster Energy), 17 points

2025 FIM World Rally-Raid GP2 class standings (after 5 of 5 rounds)

2^nd – Ebster (Hero/Monster Energy), 80 points

Up next…

With the Rallye du Maroc serving as the conclusion of the 2025 FIM World Rally-Raid Championship, the 2026 WRRC five round season opens with the legendary Dakar Rally, Jan. 3-17, in Saudi Arabia. For more information on the upcoming 2026 WRRC season, visit www.worldrallyraidchampionship.com