Five Iveco trucks in the top ten in the ranking reserved for the bison of the road in the prologue that opened the 2024 Dakar with a 27 kilometer special that immediately gave an indication of what the content of this edition in Saudi Arabia should be. Janus Van Kasteren together with Marcel Snijders and Darek Rodewald prevailed at the start of the marathon which saw 47 crews at the start.
The Dutchman, winner of the last edition, immediately wanted to dictate the pace with the leading Iveco Powerstar of the Boss Machinery team De Rooy FPT, leaving the Praga V4S DKR of Ales Loprais, the Czech crew who last year, 16″ behind. last year he had competed for the leadership with Janus until the bad rollover which forced him to retire.
Loprais is already caught in the grip of two Ivecos, given that Mitchel Van der Brink has taken third place with the Powerstar managed by Eurol Rallysport: the 21 year old Dutchman is 45″ behind his former teammate and now rival of De Rooy team. Mitchel can count on the full support of the more experienced Martin Van der Brink, the father who brought the Iveco T-Way used for fast assistance into the top 10, albeit with a delay of 2'33”.
If Van Kasteren and the young Van der Brink had not battled last year, racing with different colors in De Rooy's team, this year they will be rivals who will not hold back in the fight for the top and this could play in favor of Loprais who also faces this Dakar alone, without external help.
The prologue also tells us about two other protagonists to keep an eye on: we are talking about Jaroslav Valtr with the Tatra Buggyra of ZM Racing and his teammate Pascal De Baar with a similar vehicle: the Czech finished fourth at 59″, while the The Dutchman completed his stage at 1'09”, just seven seconds faster to stay ahead of Martin Macik's Iveco Powerstar, one of the contenders for final success with the truck developed by MM Technology.
Valtr and De Baar did not push hard, preferring to take measures on a path that was not in line and which already presented the various difficulties that the competitors will have to face in the next few days: in short, it was a debut, short but probative.
It should therefore come as no surprise that Gert Huzing's seventh place with the interesting Renault C460 Hybrid further developed by the Jongbloed Dakar team: the Dutchman had to contend with an orange compatriot who had made his debut in the Arab marathon: we are talking about Michiel Becx immediately behind at ease with the Iveco Powerstar of the De Rooy team colored in the Becx Competition livery, the other branch of the structure led by Gerard.
A couple of minutes later, the third Tatra appears, in the Jamal version of Vaidotas Paskevicius, another very expert character who immediately showed his claws. Of note in 14th place was the excellent debut of Claudio Bellina, Bruno Gotti and Marco Arnoletti competing with the second Powerstar of the MM Technology team.
Dakar 2024 – General classification Trucks
Prologue: Alula – Alula
Special: 27 km; Transfer: 130 Total: 157 km
| POS. | Pilot/Mechanic/Navigator | Truck | Time/detachment |
| 1. | Van Kasteren-Snijders-Rodewald | Iveco Powerstar | in 19'34 |
| 2. | Loprais-Valtr jr-Stross | Prague V4S DKR | at 16″ |
| 3. | Van den Brink M.-De Pol-Torrallardona | Iveco Powerstar | at 45″ |
| 4. | Valtr-Kilian-Kilian | Tatra Phoenix Buggyra | at 59″ |
| 5. | De Baar P.-Sikola-Vershoor | Tatra Phoenix Buggyra | at 1'09″ |
| 6. | Macik-Svanda-Tomasek | Iveco Powerstar | at 1'16″ |
| 7. | Huzink-Buursen-Roesink | Renault C460 Hybrid | at 1'27″ |
| 8. | Becx-Kuijpers-Van Ginkel | Iveco Powerstar | at 1'43″ |
| 9. | Paskevicuis-Veliamovic-Gaspariunas | Tatra Jamal | at 2'02″ |
| 10. | Van den Brink M.-Van der Vaet-Mouw | Iveco T-Way | at 2'33″ |
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