2023 Dakar Rally KTM team lineup

KTM is the biggest winner of the Dakar Rally motorcycle group since the recent millennium. From 2001 to 2019 (including the suspension in 2008), KTM achieved 18 consecutive championships in Dakar, and it was not until 2020 and 2021 that Honda won the championship. The year 2022 is still not KTM's lucky year. In this year, KTM's only noteworthy result in the rally is the Dakar championship won by its Spanish sub-brand GasGas, which is also an honor of KTM's camp.

In 2023, the competition team of Red Bull KTM factory team is still the all-champion team composed of the first three. Walker, Price and Kevin are the winners of previous Dakar championships. Together, they have won four Dakar championships. But heroes don't mention the courage of that year. That's all the achievements in the past. Looking closely at the status of the three of them this year, I feel that the situation of this Dakar KTM factory team is really not good. Let's talk about it in detail.


No. 8 biker Toby Price
Dakar's best achievements: two championships in 2016 and 2019, and three runners-up in 2015, 2018 and 2020
Achievements in 2022: Dakar 10th, Abu Dhabi 4th, Morocco unfinished
Nationality: Australia
Height: 1.88 meters
Weight: 93kg

The Australian biker is a versatile star. Price not only won two Dakar motorcycle group championships for KTM, but also has been running four wheel races, including the truck race in Australia and the Baja 1000 rally in North America. This year, he also won the biker group championship in the Finke Desert race by driving a Mitsubishi pickup truck. He has won six motorcycle group championships in this race, It is the first double champion across the two groups of auto and motorcycle.

However, in this year's motorcycle race, Price did not achieve any brilliant results. At the beginning of the year, Dakar had been struggling to catch up with him because of the navigation error in the first stage of the opening stage, and finally only got the 10th overall result. The fourth place in the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge in March was his best result in the motorcycle race this year. He had kept a very good pace in the Moroccan Rally, but he failed to participate in the Andalusia Rally because he failed to finish the race because of a biker crash. Therefore, in the W2R Rally Championship, he only ranks 12th in the annual scoreboard. I hope he can get rid of his bad luck and make another success in the new Dakar Rally. If he can win the third Dakar championship, he will surpass the two championships of Auriol, Lasier and Mayoni, and even the record of three motorcycle group championships set by Sencott in 2003.


No.52 biker Matthias Walker
Dakar's best achievements: champion in 2018, runner-up in 2017 and 2019, and runner-up in 2022
Achievements in 2022: Dakar ranks third, Abu Dhabi ranks fifth, and the tendon of the upper arm is operated in July
Nationality: Austria
Height: 1.78 meters
Weight: 83 kg

Don't be fooled by his No. 52 number plate. Vockner is an absolute first-line biker in the field of rally bikers. He has been on the podium four times in the past six Dakars. Among them, in 2018, he became the first Austrian biker to win the championship in Dakar, which is also regarded as a gold sticker for KTM, an Austrian biker factory. Like this year's Italian biker Baghna won the MotoGP championship for the Italian brand Ducati, he will be regarded as a hero in the motherland. In his early years, Walker was a ski athlete. At the age of 14, he changed from skiing to cross-country motorcycle. He won the MX1 cross-country world championship twice in 2010 and 2011, won the MX3 cross-country world championship in 2012, and then entered the rally race under the guidance of Heinzkini Gardner, another Austrian rally champion. He won the championship of the Greek rally for the first time in 2014, and won the annual championship of the International Motorcycle Federation as a black horse in 2015, Start to occupy a place in the rally biker industry.

In 2022, Walker experienced great ups and downs, and Dakar won the third place at the beginning of the year. Then, he broke his shoulder in the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge and still insisted on winning the fifth place. He had hoped for conservative treatment for the laceration of the tendon in the upper arm, but his recovery was not ideal, so he had to undergo surgery in the summer. As a result, Walker missed two games in the second half of the year and could not compete with Sunderland in the championship. For Walker, who has successfully completed Dakar for six consecutive years, the recovery of his shoulder may be an important factor affecting his performance this year. I believe he will still start his 9th Dakar Rally with full confidence, and hope that his physical factors will not affect his performance.


47th biker Kevin Benavides
Best achievements in Dakar: champion in 2021, runner-up in 2018
Achievements in 2022: 100th in Dakar, 13th in Abu Dhabi, 6th in Morocco, 2nd in Andalusia
Nationality: Argentina
Height: 1.72 meters
Weight: 74 kg

Kevin was the latest of the three KTM bikers to join. After winning the championship in Dakar in 2021, he switched to KTM from Honda camp. In addition, Kevin's brother Luciano Benavides also played in the Huswana factory team of KTM camp. In 2016, Kevin completed the first show in Dakar on behalf of Honda in his native Argentina, winning a stage championship and the fourth place in the total score. In 2017, he failed to participate in the pre-match training due to hand fracture. He was a favorite to win the championship again in 2018, until he lost his chance to win the championship in the tenth stage, and finally won the second place by virtue of the stable performance of other stages. In Dakar, Peru, in 2019, when he was punished for three hours, his final result was fixed at 19th place. However, Honda successfully withdrew this punishment through appeal after the game, and restored his result to fifth place. That year was also the first time that Kevin's teammate Brabeck broke the long-term monopoly of KTM and won the championship for Honda, which greatly encouraged Kevin and encouraged him to win the championship the next year.

In short, Kevin has played quite steadily in Honda's five years of service. In addition to the 19th place in 2020 due to engine failure, the performance of the other four Dakars has not fallen out of the top five. After joining KTM, Kevin still made considerable efforts, but his efforts were always not reflected in the race results for various reasons. 2022 was the year when he tried to defend the Dakar championship, but the cylinder explosion in the 10th stage completely lost his chance. The bikercrash in the first stage of the Moroccan Rally and the speeding penalty in the Andalusia Rally seem to have not had enough luck this year. His annual total points are only ranked seventh. However, the 7th of this year is also the best result among the three KTM bikers.