The fight for the FIA World Rally Championship title is set to go down to the wire after Hyundai’s Ott Tanak (above) took a dramatic victory on the Central European Rally on Sunday.
On a weekend when his teammate Thierry Neuville looked primed to clinch his first WRC crown, Tanak secured the win by 7.0s after eight-time WRC champ Sebastien Ogier crashed his Toyota GR Yaris Rally1 on a left-hand corner in the penultimate stage. Overnight leader Ogier had been trailing the Estonian by just 1.5s at the time of his incident.
Tanak’s win, his second of the year, has set up an-all Hyundai final-round showdown with Neuville at next month’s season-closing Rally Japan.
Neuville, a five-time WRC title runner-up, had been on course to finally secure his first drivers’ crown before a costly spin in his Hyundai i20 N Hybrid1 on Saturday morning cost him the rally lead. He ended Sunday’s final leg in third place, 25.8s behind second-placed GR Yaris driver Elfyn Evans, with his championship lead over Tanak cut from 29 to 25 points and a maximum of 30 points on offer in Japan.
Despite Ogier’s misfortune, strong Super Sunday performances from his Toyota teammates Evans and Takamoto Katsuta helped trim Hyundai’s advantage in the WRC manufacturers’ championship to 15 points. Katsuta was the fastest driver on the final day, including the rally-closing, bonus points-paying Wolf Power Stage, ensuring a tense finale in Japan where, for the first time since 2021, both the WRC drivers’ and manufacturers’ titles will be decided at the season-closer.
Neuville, Ogier, and Tanak all took turns at leading the rally, which kicked off in Prague on Thursday evening and featured an array of slippery, all-asphalt stages spread across the Czech Republic, Austria, and Germany. Tanak struggled with his i20 N’s setup on Friday morning and initially languished in fifth place, but his pace improved as the event progressed, culminating in a 21st career victory and an outside shot at a second crown for the 2019 WRC champ.
“Let’s see for the championship,” said a cautious Tanak. “Obviously, with what happened to Seb…it is always difficult to fight a friend and then something like this happens, so it is difficult to find feelings. Everything changed, especially in the manufacturers’ championship. We took care to have a clean [final] stage and bring the points home.”
Katsuta’s strong Sunday run, combined with Ogier’s exit, saw him finish fourth overall, albeit 41.2s behind Neuville. It was a solid finish for the Japanese runner and bodes well for his home event next month – another all-asphalt affair.
Beyond the Hyundai/Toyota lead fight, Gregoire Munster climbed to fifth in his M-Sport Ford Puma Rally1, equaling his career-best result after Toyota rising star Sami Pajari rolled his GR Yaris on Sunday’s opening stage – a frustrating end to his first asphalt event in a Rally1 car.
In WRC2, the second tier of international rallying, Nikolay Gryazin stormed through Sunday’s final leg to secure a commanding class victory, winning by a margin of 2m23.9s over the next driver registered for WRC2 points, Filip Mares.
The Citroen C3 Rally2 driver seized the lead on the rally’s second stage and never surrendered it, maintaining his position at the top throughout the tri-nation fixture. Gryazin racked up more than 10 fastest stage times in WRC2 over the course of the event and built a substantial advantage by Saturday evening, which he further extended over the closing stages.
But while Gryazin celebrated, his DG Sport Competition teammate, Yohan Rossel, endured a more difficult weekend.
The Frenchman needed to win the class to keep his WRC2 championship hopes alive, but ultimately languished more than 15 minutes back from the lead after two costly off-road excursions. His result means that Sami Pajari and Oliver Solberg – neither of whom were scoring points this week, although Solberg did start the event to gain asphalt experience and finished second-highest Rally2 car – are now the only drivers in line for the WRC2 crown.
Current WRC2 points leader Solberg has completed his seven points-scoring events and must now wait to see if Toyota GR Yaris Rally 2 driver Pajari can wrest the title from him on the Finn’s seventh and final scoring round in Japan.
The 13th and final round of the 2024 WRC season, Rally Japan, takes place on the tight, twisting, leaf-strewn roads around Aichi, Nov. 21-24. And although Neuville remains the firm favorite to land that elusive first WRC title, Tanak’s late-season surge says this might not be over yet.
WRC Central European Rally, final positions after Leg Three, SS18
1 Ott Tanak/Martin Jarveoja (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) 2h37m34.6s
2 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +7.0s
3 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +39.8s
4 Takamoto Katsuta/Aaron Johnston (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +1m21.0s
5 Gregoire Munster/Louis Louka (Ford Puma Rally1) +3m41.9s
6 Nikolay Gryazin/Konstantin Aleksandrov (Citroen C3 – WRC2 winner) +9m17.6s
7 Oliver Solberg/Elliott Edmondson (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2 – non-points) +9m34.1s
8 Filip Mares/Radovan Bucha (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 – WRC2) +11m41.5s
9 Miko Marczyk/Szymon Gospodarczyk (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +12m10.6s
10 Kajetan Kajetanowicz/Maciej Szczepaniak (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +12m20.3s
WRC Drivers’ Championship after 12 of 13 rounds
1 Neuville 222 points
2 Tanak 196
3 Evans 179
4 Sebastien Ogier 166
5 Adrien Fourmaux 141
WRC Manufacturers’ Championship after 12 of 13 rounds
1 Hyundai Motorsport 519 points
2 Toyota Gazoo Racing 498
3 M-Sport Ford 260
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