Desert race 'filler' on the cards

The TDR has once again moved back to South Africa and will be hosted in the Limpopo Province as the Waterberg1000 Rally. The Waterberg1000 is lined up to be part of the 2025 World Rally-Raid Championship (W2RC) rounds as the local sporting scene counts costs.

Local authorities had penned a five-year deal with the custodians of the race, the South African Cross Country Series, to host the race in Botswana from 2023-2027. This marked Matshwabisi's return to Botswana since 2019 after it had relocated to Upington in the Northern Cape. In the last five years, Botswana has now lost the race on four occasions, with the 2020, 2021, and 2022 editions held in South Africa. Out of the 43 editions since the race's inception in 1981, 30 have been hosted in Botswana. The three-day marathon now looks very unlikely to return to local shores with an entry into the W2RC on the horizon.