


Stage 6 @ Dakar 2025: Defending champ Brabec takes wins, race at the top of standings tightens
Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally’s Ricky Brabec, the defending Dakar Rally champion, won his first stage of the 2025 Dakar Rally, Round 1 of the FIM World Rally-Raid Championship, as the topped the field in Saturday’s Stage 6 run from Hail to Al Duwadimi, Saudi Arabia. And joining Brabec on the all-Monster Energy Stage 6 podium were his Honda teammate, Adrien Van Beveren, in 2nd place and Jose “Nacho” Cornejo (Hero Motosports, fueled by Monster Energy) in 3rd.
But as the Monster Energy/Honda Rally HRC celebrated, the mood was much more somber in the Hero, fueled by Monster Energy pits as defending WRRC overall champion, Ross Branch, was forced to exit the race following a crash. Fortunately for Branch, he was able to walk under his own power to the rescue helicopter. But once any racer agrees to be assisted in this fashion, his or her Dakar is over. Branch was running in 4th place overall in the standings when the crash occurred. His teammate, Cornejo, is now the lone Hero/Monster Energy racer remaining in the Dakar.
With the Stage 6 victory, Brabec bumped up to 4th place in the overall standings, but is still over 20 minutes back of leader Daniel Sanders (KTM). The closest Monster Energy-backed racer to the lead is Schareina, who’s 11:46 back of Sanders. Overall, Monster Energy racers occupy six of the top eight positions overall. Schareina 2nd, Van Beveren 3rd, Brabec 4th, Skyler Howes (Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally) 5th, Pablo Quintanilla (Monster Energy/Honda HRC Rally) 7th and Cornejo 8th.
Sunday’s Stage 7, featuring a 419 km Special (716 km total), runs a loop from Al Duwadimi – and back to Al Duwadimi. “Fiendish” navigation according to race officials, the stage mixes up fast and slow terrain – and throws in a “touch of mountain racing” for good measure. Bikes and cars split up on this stage, which will make tracking tough – and such will be the case for much of the remaining stages.
LOOKING FOR A VIDEO RECAP? CLICK HERE FOR THE STAGE 6 HIGHLIGHTS!


Said Brabec: "Day after rest day. Man, it feels so good to be back to racing. Means just a day closer to leaving (laughter). Nah, today was good. It was an eventful day. We lost fellow Monster athlete (Branch) who had been in the race. But he’s all good. Other than that the stage was great. We started out in the hard pack, rocks, which I really liked. I made an adjustment to the machine over rest day and I was really happy with what I did. Unfortunately, I’m still battling a couple issues. The main one is this rear tire that they have us running. We’ll get it to the end of the rally, though. With six days left we can claw back some time. It’s hard, because I want to be the top finishing Monster/Honda guy, but the team is all riding really well so all of us are on the same page. All fighting equally as hard. Push, get some time back, and land ourselves on the podium. So at the end of the day I think it’ll be a good day, once we figure out how to play this tablet game. Once we figure this out I think we will get ‘favored’ time back. Think about that day in and day out when I’m racing. I have an idea. Stay tuned.”

Said Howes: “Stage 6 was another battle for me. I started out quite nice, more rally style. Fast paced, more open terrain. Some rocks, some tricky navigation. Up to the refueling I had a really good pace going. Doing a strong job with the navigation. Then after refueling I kind of had just a little brain fade moment. I went like 100, 200 meters too far after a waypoint. I did exactly what the roadbook told me, but I just kind of overshot the correct corner. So it put me into a weird spot. Turned around and re-did it, losing about four minutes. Annoying that I had that brain fade moment. Then we had a 170 kilometer transfer in the middle of the Special, then after that was 200 kilometers of dunes and fast, sandy tracks. Started having a little bit of technical difficulties… fighting my suspension setting a little bit. That last 200 kilometers was kind of a battle for me. Really had to push through it. Beat my hands up, arms, quite a bit hanging on to the bike. Lost a couple more minutes just in the last 200 kilometers. Just had hoped to chip away at a little bit more time today instead of losing some (time). But in the end we’re smiling because we’re racing dirt bikes and this is the coolest thing in the world.”

Said Cornejo: “Done with Stage 6. Very fast stage compared to what we had last week. I rode good, navigated good. Just a solid day. But I’m just a bit sad for my teammate Ross (Branch) who had a crash and had to abandon the race. So we will keep doing our best, day by day, stage by stage to bring some joy to the team.”

Stage 6 Notes:
- Three Monster Energy racers entered Stage 6’s final dune section (Brabec, Van Beveren & Cornejo), with Brabec powering out first – some 23 seconds ahead of Van Beveren. Cornejo pushed hard as well at the end, and all three finished on the same minute. This after Van Beveren lead pretty much the entire stage. Doing so he claimed more than six minutes of bonus time, which will be crucial in his pursuit of the overall Dakar podium.
- Brabec on opening Stage 7 on Sunday: “Tomorrow, we open the stage. This Dakar has been tough (on the first bikes out). You can win the Dakar without winning any stage, so tomorrow we know we’re going to lose a little bit of time. But I’m lucky to have Adrien (Van Beveren) starting behind me and Nacho (Cornejo) starting right behind him.”
- Saturday’s 3rd place run for Cornejo was his third 3rd place finish in a row.
- Long day on Saturday. 800 kilometers total, 600-some of that were Specials. Both Van Beveren (2nd) and Schareina, in a close by 4th, gained five minutes on race leader Sanders with a ton of racer left to go.


Monster Energy Dakar Stage 6 Motorcycle Results
Place/Name/Team/Time
1st – Ricky Brabec (Monster Energy/Honda)
2nd – Adrien Van Beveren (Monster Energy/Honda)
05:01:14 (- minus 00:00:23)
3rd – Jose Cornejo (Hero/Monster Energy)
05:01:42 (- minus 00:00:51)
4th – Tosha Schareina (Monster Energy/Honda)
05:03:18 (- minus 00:02:27)
Monster Energy Dakar Motorcycle Standings (after Stage 6)
Place/Name/Team/Time
2nd – Tosha Schareina (Monster Energy/Honda)
35:30:35 (- minus 00:11:46)
3rd – Adrien Van Beveren (Monster Energy/Honda)
35:38:00 (- minus 00:19:11)
4th – Ricky Brabec (Monster Energy/Honda)
35:42:07 (- minus 00:23:18)
5th – Skyler Howes (Monster Energy/Honda)
35:46:14 (- minus 00:27:25)
Monster Energy Dakar SSV Class
Stage 6 SSV Results
20th – Sara Price (Can-Am Factory Team)
(- minus 07:27:14)
Overall
23rd – Sara Price (Can-Am Factory Team)
116:33:27 (- minus 58:00:00)
Up next…
Stage 7, featuring a 419 km Special (716 km total), runs a loop from Al Duwadimi – and back to Al Duwadimi. “Fiendish” navigation according to race officials, the stage mixes up fast and slow terrain – and throws in a “touch of mountain racing” for good measure. Bikes and cars split up on this stage, which will make tracking tough – and such will be the case for much of the remaining stages. For more information, including “Live” timing and scoring, visit www.dakar.com