Luciano Benevides put the 2026 Dakar Rally motorcycle competitors on notice today that he is here to stay. Yesterday's stage winner went out like a bullet today, opening the longest special stage of the 2026 course solo, grabbing every available second of bonus time and taking back-to-back stage wins and his third stage win of the year in four days. An absolutely dominating performance from Benevides today saw him not only best Daniel Sanders by nearly five minutes, he also held off a strategic Ricky Brabec by more than five minutes. If that wasn't enough, Benevides also put himself at the front of the overall rankings, leapfrogging over his teammate Sanders to sit at the top with a ten second gap to Sanders. Brabec is third, 4:47 back after the day didn't work out like he'd hoped.d

Stage eight was fast, faster than most racers predicted, and without much in challenging navigation points. And Luciano Benevides was the fastest.

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Dakar Rally Daily is produced and edited by Jesse Ziegler, and hosted by Quinn Cody and Jesse Ziegler.