Off-road racer Sara Price celebrates breakthrough at Dakar Rally

Sara Price slid out of her off-road vehicle at the Dakar Rally, after a rigorous ride through the diabolical dust and dunes in Saudi Arabia, and had to check for certain she had made history in the endurance event.

«I don’t think an American female’s ever won a stage, right?» she asked.

Price was right: The 31-year-old Californian this week became the first female American driver and third woman ever to win a Dakar stage.

Not bad for a Dakar rookie.

Price has forged a career out of remote adventures around the globe. She is a former X Games medalist, drove in an electric racing series for Daytona 500 and Indianapolis 500 team owner Chip Ganassi, was a national dirt bike champion, and went Hollywood for a spell, earning credits as a stunt driver, including in «Jumanji: The Next Level.»

But racing in Dakar?

The off-road race that stretches for thousands of miles, this year held for up to 15 days throughout the jagged rocks and canyons in Saudi territory, had been a dream for Price since 2015.

«This year, I finally just said, you know what, I’m going,» Price told The Associated Press. «If that takes spending every ounce of dollars I have in my savings account, I’m going to make it happen. I don’t want to wait anymore. I was trying to get sponsors and funding to make it happen, I’d say heavily the last five years, and it just wasn’t happening. It’s a very expensive race to do.»

Price poured in her own money, held fundraisers in Canyon Lake, California, where she was raised, to collect roughly $500,000, and «took a leap of faith» to reach Dakar. She warmed up for Dakar in October with a second-place finish overall in the World Rally-Raid Championship in Morocco, also becoming the first American woman to earn a stage win in the race more commonly known as Rallye du Maroc.

«We really did not expect to do as well as we did, but we ended up winning some stages and making some history there,» Price said. «That was huge, especially too to be at the forefront for our country. All the little girls, looking up to me, saying, ‘Hey, I can do it, too,’ that’s pretty cool.»

Price was just getting started.

She arrived in Saudi Arabia as a privateer with a group that included her mechanic, her navigator, her best friend and her boyfriend — fellow driver Ricky Brabec, who in 2020 became the first American to win the motorcycle division at Dakar — to not just race but even just drive in a country that only lifted a ban on women driving in 2018. The ban had relegated women to the backseat, restricting when and how they moved around.

For nearly three decades, outspoken Saudi women and the men who supported them had called for women to have the right to drive. They faced arrest for defying the ban as women in other Muslim countries drove freely.

Take a look this week in Al-Ula, Saudi Arabia, there’s Price racing a Can-Am Maverick X3 UTV over 230 miles to a stage victory in the T4 class (production models).

«The parts I’ve been in Saudi Arabia, I haven’t ever felt uncomfortable,» she said. «There’s times I’m a little bit cautious, but it’s all about kind of having your wits about you. Common sense. You’ve got to respect other cultures and how they are. Other people are raised a different way, and I respect that. I come to their country knowing what I can do to make them feel comfortable as well as be comfortable myself.»

She has little time to play tourist, although she did enjoy a pre-Dakar trip to Elephant Rock, a sandstone formation in Saudi Arabia.

Originally a circuit from Paris to Dakar, Senegal, the race has been run across Saudi Arabia since 2020. Price, with help from navigator Jeremy Gray, has since joined Jutta Kleinschmidt and Cristina Gutiérrez as female winners at Dakar.

«If you go anywhere else and race in the world, everyone knows Dakar Rally,» Price said. «They know Dakar is a pinnacle of off-road. Everyone knows the racers. But if you come to America, not everyone really is familiar with it or they don’t know the racers. It’s not quite as intense as the rest of the world.»

Perhaps Price’s stage win — with two stages left to go, the next two days are pivotal to her in clinching a victory or finishing on the podium — can open some eyes from fans and corporate sponsors in the American racing world.

«My whole life has been surrounded by racing,» she said. «I’ve raced from two wheels to four wheels, a lot of different disciplines. This is the pinnacle for me.»