Title glory on the line as Mantshwabisi hosts finale
Kabelo Boranabi | Monday November 24, 2025 06:00
The Mantshwabisi 300km Desert Race, which is the sixth and final round of the 2025 BORRC, is the country’s only car racing competition. This is a race no team can bluff their way through, from racing's birthplace. The route is savage, the dunes shift, the ruts punish, and every kilometre has the potential to crown a champion or break a season in half.
Mantshwabisi has built a reputation as the stage where titles are won with grit, discipline and a bit of madness.
Promoted by Cyro Motorsport Group, the event brings together 15 teams and thousands of spectators, all converging on one question: who survives Mantshwabisi and who claims the 2025 crowns?
The FIA class has a clear front-runner in the leading duo of Dewald van Breda and co-driver Adriaan Roets, who are on 63 points.
It looks like a clear win for the pair, as the duo of Loic Bathfield and Stuart Gregory is on two points. Mathematically, the two are still alive, but Mantshwabisi has a habit of rewriting scripts.
Van Breda needs a clean, controlled race to seal it and avoid the mechanical gremlins that haunt this terrain.
The tension is sky-high in the Special Vehicle class. The duo of Khalii Hussain and Andre Geldenhuys are in the lead with 38 points.
In second place and 30 points behind is the pair of Adeeb Davids and Muneeb Cassim, whilst in third place and also in contention are Kobamelo Maruapula and Nonofo Dikhoodu with eight points. Former Dakar Rally two-wheelers, James Alexander and John Kelly, have five points.
Hussain and Geldenhuys are favourites, but the class is notorious for rollovers, blown suspensions, and last-minute heartbreaks. One mistake and the entire table flips.
The Production Vehicle division has produced some of the fiercest battles of the season and proved to be a titan class in the 2025 BORRC. In the lead are Nielen Marx and Rikus Hattingh on 65 points.
In second place and just five points behind are Mohammed Dada and Muhammad Saloojee, whilst the pair of Shaheed Amin and Imraan Arbi sit third with 35 points. A difference of just five points at the top is a razor-thin gap heading into the roughest race of the year.
The Side-By-Side (SxS) category is one of the fastest-growing classes and closes the year with a heavyweight clash.
Leaders, Werner Mostert and Tim Botes, are on 67 points, as Martie Bachfischer and Anna van der Vyver are second with 47 points, whilst two points behind are Stefan Eloff and Japie Brunette with 45. Johannes Grobler and Arend de Jager are also in contention with 39 points.
Mostert enters as the favourite, but the SxS machines are agile, aggressive, and extremely fragile, setting the perfect conditions for an upset.