Tag: Rally Finland

Elfyn Evans (above) made major strides towards his second WRC Rally Finland victory after the Toyota Gazoo Racing driver moved into full attack mode on Saturday’s penultimate leg.

The GR Yaris Rally1 driver was fastest on seven out of eight of the gravel road stages in the super-fast Finnish forests to extend a 6.9s lead at the start of the day into a commanding 32.1s buffer at the end of the leg, leaving Thierry Neuville’s Hyundai i20 N Rally trailing in his wake.

Rain showers early in the day played to the Evans’ strengths, and while Neuville grappled with wheelspin in the wet conditions, the 2021 Rally Finland winner excelled. The Welshman was equally at home in the repeated afternoon loop where the drying gravel roads became increasingly rutted.

With WRC points leader Kalle Rovanpera already sidelined by a crash on Friday, victory at this ninth FIA World Rally Championship round is essential for Evans — currently second in the points behind his Toyota teammate — to keep his title hopes alive. He was delighted with his performance on a demanding day that contained more than half the rally’s competitive distance.

“Obviously, it’s a nice position to be in, but of course there are still more stages to come tomorrow,” said Evans. “The focus will be on that now and we’ll try to keep doing the same.”

Although Neuville struggled to get his Hyundai’s setup dialed in for the changeable conditions, the Belgian was consistently quicker than the remainder of the field. Toyota driver Takamoto Katsuta, his closest challenger, lagged almost one minute behind in third.

Katsuta had dropped behind Hyundai’s Teemu Suninen after spinning in the morning’s first run through the Paijala stage, but charged back to reclaim the final podium spot in the first stage after the lunchtime service halt. He yielded the position again in the following test, then surged back in front by posting a benchmark time through the day’s closing stage, Vekkula 2. The pair were split by just 6.4s at the overnight halt.

Toyota team principal Jari-Matti Latvala was fifth overall, two minutes further back. The 38-year-old Finn, who is making his first WRC start since February 2020 to gain a better understanding of the current breed of hybrid Rally1 cars, overshot a junction in the day’s penultimate stage, but relished the chance to drive on his home roads again.

Oliver Solberg is not registered to score WRC2 points this week but climbed to sixth overall in his Skoda Fabia RS. Behind him, Sami Pajari is in line to celebrate victory in WRC2, the second tier of international rallying, after his closest challenger, Jari Huttunen, retired.  

The 21-year-old Pajari had set the pace for much of Friday’s opening leg, but fell behind Huttunen as a result of a left-front puncture. He trailed his fellow Finn and Skoda Fabia RS driver by 12.9s heading into the penultimate day, but clawed back an amazing 10.0s in the wet-weather opener, the 11.77-mile Vastila 1 stage.

After being caught napping, Huttunen then doubled his buffer with a strong response on the legendary roads of the 12.54-mile Paijale stage, but later pulled off the road in the second pass of Vekkula. A technical issue meant he went no further and promoted Pajari back to the WRC2 top spot.

The youngster, who sits seventh in the overall rally standings, leads M-Sport Ford Fiesta MkII driver Adrien Fourmaux by 33.9s going into Sunday’s short final leg. Victory in Finland would be the first at this level for Pajari and his co-driver, Enni Malkonen.

Just four tests covering 32.09 competitive miles make up Sunday’s final leg. Drivers face two runs each on the classic roads of Moksi-Sahloinen and Himos-Jamsa. The second pass of the latter forms the bonus points-paying, rally-closing Wolf Power Stage. 

WRC Rally Finland, leading positions after Day Two, SS18
1 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +2h08m07.0s 
2 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +32.1s
3 Takamoto Katsuta/Aaron Johnson (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +1m27.8s
4 Teemu Suninen/Mikko Markkula (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +1m34.2s
5 Jari-Matti Latvala/Juho Hanninen (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +3m39.5s
6 Oliver Solberg/Wlliott Edmondson (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2/non-points) +8m05.0s
7 Sami Pajari/Enni Malkonen (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2 leader) +8m17.5s
8 Adrien Fourmaux/Alexandre Coria (Ford Fiesta MkII – WRC2) +8m51.4s
9 Andreas Mikkelsen/Torstein Eriksen (Sloda Fabia RS – WRC2) +9m42.7s
10 Nikolay Gryazin/Konstantin Aleksandrov (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +10m02.6s

Check out WRC.com, the official home of the FIA World Rally Championship. And for the ultimate WRC experience, sign up for a WRC+ All Live subscription to watch all stages of every rally live and on demand, whenever and wherever.

Elfyn Evans (above) was thrust into the lead of WRC Rally Finland when Toyota Gazoo Racing teammate Kalle Rovanpera’s untouchable streak came to an abrupt halt during Friday’s opening leg.

Home hero Rovanpera, who brought a commanding 55-point lead into the ninth round of the FIA World Rally Championship was running first car on the road, yet reeled off five consecutive fastest times through the super-fast gravel stages in his Toyota GR Yaris Rally1. Heading into the day’s seventh test, 9.64-mile Myhinpaa 2, the 22-year-old Finn was leading second-placed Evans by 5.7s and looking comfortable.

But a rare mistake 6.9 miles after the start brought a disastrous end to the reigning WRC champ’s day when he lost control of his GR Yaris, hit a rock in the roadside ditch, and rolled end over end. Rovanpera and co-driver Jonne Halttunen emerged from the wreckage unscathed, despite the force of the impact being strong enough to tear a rear wheel from the car.

“It didn’t really feel like we should have crashed,” said Rovanpera on his return — minus his stranded car — to the service park in Jyvaskyla. “Being the first car and not seeing a line to follow, especially for the rear wheels, maybe there was some mud that the rears got into? It was a full slide, full lock, and I couldn’t straighten the car. Then we hit something hard in the ditch — maybe bedrock.”   

Evans, currently second in the WRC points, inherited the top spot from his stranded teammate and negotiated the remaining two stages almost error-free to head Thierry Neuville’s Hyundai i20 N Rally by just 6.9s overnight.

“A bit of a half-spin in the final stage didn’t help, but overall it’s been an OK day,” said Evans, who was frustrated to give away 2.8s to Neuville thanks to that moment in the Harju 2 finale. “We’re pretty happy overall and obviously we’ve still got a lot of driving to do tomorrow.”

Mistakes were punished brutally on the central Finland gravel roads, and Rovanpera wasn’t the only victory contender to come unstuck. Fellow Finn Esapekka Lappi crashed his Hyundai i20 N Rally1 into a tree in SS4 while running fourth overall, while M-Sport Ford saw its chances of a decent result end before they’d barely began.

M-Sport Ford team leader and three-time Rally Finland winner Ott Tanak, who led the event after Thursday’s evening’s short super special stage in downtown Jyvaskyla, retired his Puma Rally1 in Friday’s second stage with terminal engine failure and his M-Sport teammate Pierre-Louis Loubet crashed in the same test.

Neuville’s day wasn’t without drama, either. The Belgian reported a lack of rear traction during the morning’s loop of stages and struggled for visibility under scattered rain showers on multiple occasions. By the end of the day, he headed Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta, who won the morning’s opening stage, by 9.5s.

In fourth overall and definitely still within reach of a podium place is Teemu Suninen. The Finn is contesting his second rally aboard an i20 N Rally1 and trailed Katsuta by 12.4s at the overnight halt after building his speed throughout the day.

Toyota team principal Jari-Matti Latvala, a three-time Rally Finland winner, rounded out the top five on his first WRC start since 2020. The 38-year-old Finn is using the one-off event to gain a better understanding of the hybrid Rally1 cars that have competed in the WRC’s headlining class since 2022, and despite prioritizing bringing his GR Yaris safely to the finish, he’s only 54.9s behind Suninen. 

In WRC2, the second tier of international rallying, Jari Huttunen showed he’s lost none of the speed which carried him to the 2020 WRC3 title as the 29-year-old Finn leads the way in WRC2 after Friday’s opening leg.

A year ago, Huttunen was driving a top-level Ford Puma Rally1 at his home WRC round. This year he’s out to prove a point against the WRC2 regulars after a lack of funding has left him unable to contest a full program in the class.

Huttunen led after Thursday’s super special stage in Jyvaskyla, but was quickly demoted to the second spot by fellow Finn Sami Pajari, who romped to an impressive four stage wins in a similar Skoda Fabia RS on Friday morning.

Pajari ran as high as sixth on the overall leader board, but disaster struck the 21-year-old Finn in the day’s penultimate stage when he punctured and shipped 11.1s, limping through the 5.68 miles of Halttula 2. That misfortune handed Huttunen an overnight lead of 12.9s.

Nikolay Gryazin made a steady start in his Skoda, but climbed to third after increasing his pace throughout the day and trails Pajari by just three-tenths of a second heading into Saturday’s second leg.

Saturday’s second leg is the rally’s longest leg, with eight special stages totaling 99.84 competitive miles. The loop of four morning stages are repeated in the afternoon, and with more rain in the forecast, there’s the potential for more shocks and drama on the WRC’s fastest event. 

WRC Rally Finland, leading positions after Day One, SS10
1 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +51m34.4s 
2 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +6.9s
3 Takamoto Katsuta/Aaron Johnson (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +16.4s
4 Teemu Suninen/Mikko Markkula (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +28.8s
5 Jari-Matti Latvala/Juho Hanninen (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) +1m23.7s
6 Jari Huttunen/Antti Haapala (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2 leader) +3m14.1s
7 Sami Pajari/Enni Malkonen (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +3m27.0s
8 Nikolay Gryazin/Konstantin Aleksandrov (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +3m27.3s
9 Oliver Solberg/Wlliott Edmondson (Skoda Fabia RS – WRC2) +3m28.8s
10 Adrien Fourmaux/Alexandre Coria (Ford Fiesta MkII – WRC2) +3m36.4s

Check out WRC.com, the official home of the FIA World Rally Championship. And for the ultimate WRC experience, sign up for a WRC+ All Live subscription to watch all stages of every rally live and on demand, whenever and wherever.