Rally
How Carlos Sainz became a legend of Spanish motorsports
A four-time Dakar Rally champ and WRC legend, Carlos Sainz helped put Spain on the motorsport map and is now leading Ford into the desert. Find out more about the racing legend’s career here.
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As a two-time World Rally Championship winner and four-time Dakar Rally champion, Carlos Sainz is one of Spain’s foremost sporting heroes.
Sainz is perhaps most famous for his exploits in the World Rally Championship, but it seems he was always destined to be a sports star. As a youngster he had trials at Real Madrid and was the national squash champion at the age of 16 before making a name for himself in motorsports.
33 min
A living legend
As rallying legend Carlos Sainz prepares for his 14th Dakar, hear from those who know him best.
During his 18-year WRC career he was crowned champion in 1990 and 1992, claiming 26 rally wins, 97 podiums and 757 stage wins. Now, the subject of Red Bull TV's Sainz: Live to Compete documentary, is taking on a new challenge.
After capturing his fourth Dakar Rally title in the 2024 edition at the wheel of Audi's innovative RS Q e-tron, the now 62 year old could easily have hung up his helmet and enjoyed a well-deserved retirement. Instead, 'El Matador is leading a brand new team into Dakar battle after signing for American giants Ford's new Ford Performance team, spearheading development of the brand's Raptor T1+ truck with the ultimate goal of winning the world's toughest rally raid. It's clear that Sainz lives for a challenge.
The new Ford Raptor T1+ is already looking good with Sainz at the wheel
© Kin Marcin/Red Bull Content Pool
Golfer Seve Ballesteros was coming to the end of his career when Sainz became champion, and in Sainz: Live to Compete he wonders if people would be at the airport to cheer him on when he returned home. He needn’t have worried because there were thousands cheering his name as well as chanting a new nickname that's stuck with him since: El Matador.
The show also sees Sainz’s co-driver Luis Moya point out that the sports world largely overlooked Spain at the time: “We hadn’t won the World Cup of soccer, basketball, Rafa Nadal, Marc Márquez or Pau Gasol weren’t playing yet, no one.”
Two-time Formula One world champion Fernando Alonso is of the same opinion, saying: “I think that was the moment when it clicked in our minds. Although we are Spanish, we could dominate the motor world.”
Father and son at the British Grand Prix
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
One day I asked him: 'Do you really want to take the step to run beyond the indoor tracks?' 'Yes, Dad, I’d love to' was his reply
Sports dynasties
Sons following in the footsteps of their fathers is nothing new in motorsports.
1996 Formula One Drivers’ Champion Damon Hill followed his father Graham, who won two Formula One World Championships and is also the only driver to win the Triple Crown which includes the Indianapolis 500, the 24 Hours Of Le Mans and F1 title.
There’s also the Rosbergs with Keke and Nico, who each won a Formula One title. The Schumachers, with father Michael winning seven world titles and his son Mick, now plying his trade for Haas in F1.
Let’s not forget Max Verstappen, the current Formula One World Champion, who followed his dad, Jos, into the sport and has him in the garage for support and guidance.
And of course, Carlos Sainz has been followed into the world of motorsport by his son, Carlos Sainz Jr.
Carlos Sainz Sr says he didn’t push his son into becoming a driver, but Jr’s mother, Reyes Vázquez de Castro, says she could see his ability from a young age. “At first glance you see his talent,” she explains in the show. “There is no doubt that genetics has helped, because he just inherited it. He had something other children didn’t have; it just came naturally to him.”
Carlos took his son karting, but never pressured him. “One day I asked him: 'Do you really want to take the step to run beyond the indoor tracks?' 'Yes, Dad, I’d love to' was his reply,” says Carlos Sr in the show.
Carlos Jr says there was some added pressure with being his father’s son. But it pushed him, and the Formula One race winner now drives for one of the most famous teams in F1 – Ferrari.
History made as Dakar's oldest winner celebrates the 2024 victory
© Flavien Duhamel/Red Bull Content Pool
No age restrictions
Carlos Sainz turned 60 in April, 2022. But while most sports stars are reminiscing about their glory days by that age, Sainz is still competing – and winning – proving that you can stay at the top.
After 18 years in WRC, Sainz had his head turned towards Dakar. “I race in the Dakar because of Colin [McRae],” says Sainz in the show. McRae was Sainz’s friend and rival when the pair raced for Subaru in 2004-2005. “He told me I had to do the Dakar and that I would like it. It’s for you and I’m sure you’d do well. You have to try. It was him pushing me.”
Sainz: Live to Compete lays out Sainz’s Dakar career, explaining how he can develop any car into a winner. He won in 2010 with a Volkswagen Touareg, again in 2018 with a Peugeot 3008 and in 2020 with a Mini John Cooper Works Buggy.
Sainz driving through the desert inthe groundbreaking Audi e-tron
© Flavien Duhamel/Red Bull Content Pool
The three-time winner's biggest achievement to date however came between 2022 and 2024, when his driving skill and incredible ability to develop cars helped turn Audi's RS Q e-tron hybrid first into a Dakar rally stage winner and then, in the 2024 edition, a winner of the world's toughest motorsport race.
Now, the goal is to do the same with Ford and deliver the American giant it's first-ever Dakar Rally title. If anyone can do it, it's Carlos Sainz.
Ford is serious about winning Dakar, that's why they signed Sainz
© Kin Marcin /Red Bull Content Pool
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