In January before the start of the American off-road racing season, Brock Heger was asked if he would consider tackling the Dakar Rally someday, to which he responded, “I wouldn’t say no.”
Almost seven months later, he can confirm that he did not say no.
On Monday, Polaris announced Heger and defending SSV winner Xavier de Soultrait will comprise the line-up for Sébastien Loeb Racing at the 2025 Dakar Rally. Heger will have his Polaris Factory Racing colleague Max Eddy Jr. as his co-driver while Martin Bonnet returns to Soultrait’s right side.
Heger is one of the top off-road racers in America today with success in both short course and desert racing. Since 2021, he has claimed a title of some form on an annual basis starting with Championship Off-Road’s Pro Lite crown followed by its Pro Stock SxS the year after. He then won the 2023 SCORE International Pro UTV Open championship with Polaris Factory Racing, which included being the fastest UTV outright at the Baja 500 and Baja 400.
He returned to PFR for the 2024 desert season, continuing his momentum by winning his class at King of the Hammers‘ UTV Hammers Championship and Toyo Tires Desert Challenge. Heger is currently third in SCORE’s Pro UTV Open points halfway through that series’ season with a second at San Felipe and twelfth in the Baja 500.
Eddy is a five-time Baja 1000 winner on a bike before switching to four wheels. He is far from a stranger to navigating or the Dakar, having worked as Cole Potts’ co-driver at the 2019 Dakar in South America then called the shots for PFR boss Craig Scanlon during the SCORE season. PFR promoted him to factory driving duties for 2024.
SLR, whose namesake owner is a rally legend, signed a five-year deal with Polaris starting with the 2023 Dakar. For the 2024 edition, Polaris Factory Racing débuted a rally raid variant of their SCORE-winning Polaris RZR Pro R Factory, with which Soultrait and team-mate Florent Vayssade won a combined four stages en route to the SSV overall. It was Polaris’ first Dakar triumph since 2017.
“Securing the win last year was not only a monumental achievement for Polaris and SLR, but also a profound and dramatic demonstration of the performance, sophistication and sheer toughness of our RZR Pro R Factory platform,” commented PFR technical director Alex Scheuerell. “We’re thrilled to bring two of our Polaris Factory Race team members into this incredibly successful partnership with SLR. Brock Heger has shown he’s up for this challenge, after extraordinary performances throughout the SCORE series and the King of the Hammers Desert Challenge, and backed by Max’s extensive experience at Dakar, we’re eager to see this duo compete on a global stage.”
The Pro R Factory rally car, which Scheuerell told The Checkered Flag is internally dubbed the “international or FIA” model, shares numerous features with the desert counterpart (called the “North America” version) such as the same ProStar Fury 2.0 engine and internal bypass shocks. Otherwise, the former has boasts accommodations like a windshield and wipers, sidepods for spare parts, and production bodywork to comply with SSV/T4 regulation. In fact, Scheuerell revealed to TCF that development on the UTV initially launched “with the FIA rules in mind.”
Many elements of the Dakar winner were later applied to PFR’s second-generation Pro R Factory, which won its class at the first two rounds of the SCORE season with Cayden MacCachren. While a 2025 run is not in the works right now, MacCachren has expressed to TCF his interest in running Dakar someday.
The 2025 Dakar Rally runs 3–17 January.
