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“This has been the toughest Dakar that I have ever done”

The talented American is still only 26 years old, but off-road racing runs in Austin’s blood. ‘AJ’ as he’s known on the bivouac, spent his childhood learning the ins and outs of racing, although it was only in 2018 that he got behind the wheel himself, after spending a year as his dad’s co-driver. In his first full season, Austin took the SCORE International championship by storm, claiming victories at the Baja 500 and Baja 1000 in the Trophy Truck Spec class. Austin took his first steps in rally-raid towards the end of 2018 by entering the Rallye du Maroc. Second on the 2021 Dakar, he followed that up by competing in the World Cup for Cross Country Rallies, taking three wins, including the final in Abu Dhabi to lift his first world title -the Monster Energy Can-Am official going on to win his first Dakar at the beginning of 2022. Throughout the American has relied on his Brazilian co-driver's even more impressive record of achievements. Gustavo Gugelmin has six Dakars under his belt. In 2018, with his compatriot Reinaldo Varela, he won the SSV category and followed that by winning the 2019 world cup in their category. Ten years ago, the Brazilian won the FIA World Cup in the T2 category. After their 2022 Dakar win and the marathon status points it gave them, the Jones / Gugelmin pairing were logical favourites to take the inaugural 2022 W2RC championship. Except a run of bad luck stopped them from making the break from rivals Mareck Goczal and Rokas Baciuska and going into the final round in Andalusia the three were separated by just 2 points! In the end Austin finished the race in fourth place to take third in the championship. For the 2023 Dakar and for the rest of the year Jones and Gugelmin will be moving up to the just as fiercely competitive T4 category and a different set of rivals, among them the current champion ‘Chaleco’ Lopez. 

" This has been the toughest Dakar that I have ever done. We've had ups and downs, but we just stayed consistent, did our thing and look at us, back to back, huh? We're super happy, big shout-out to all the team, my navigator, Gustavo, did a good job. It was a nice little road trip around Saudi Arabia."