Ott Tanak and Hyundai triumph in Sardinia and return to wins

Ott Tanak celebrated his last WRC victory last February at the Lapland Rally. Since then, the whole of 2021 has been plagued by multiple mechanical problems and problematic settings in the Hyundai i20, but also this year with the youth problems of the i20 N Rally1.

It all ended on Sunday afternoon in Sardinia after a tiring race in very high temperatures in which the Estonian won 9 of the 21 Special Routes. This was Hyundai’s first win this year after many reliability problems with its new hybrid rally car.

The race started with the initial lead of Toyota Esapeka Lapi, who used its favorable starting position in the Italian island’s tough enough specials to take the overall lead. Tanak was very close to the Finn, while Elfyn Evans saw his hopes of this year’s title dashed by a water leak on day one.

The development of the rally

The first day ended with Tanak’s Lapi a mere 0.7” advantage, but before that the Estonian from Hyundai had his share: given the last two EDs on Friday, the i20 N’s gearbox system had Rally1’s serious problem would cost him a lot of time costs. However, the last two specials were canceled, giving Hyundai a chance to resolve the issue for free.

Tanak now took advantage of a good starting position and on Saturday won 6 of the 8 specials to take the lead while Lapi lost ground and eventually left. This Sunday it was even easier for the Estonian, who completed his dominance in the match with two more wins. Behind him, Craig Brin scored a much-needed result in his difficult start this year with the Ford Puma Rally1.

M-Sport’s Pierre-Luis Lube also achieved his best result in the WRC with fourth place – which could have been higher if he hadn’t crashed early. Winner of the last three races, Toyota’s Kale Rovanpera lost more than a minute clearing the road on Friday and was left behind early on.

His goal was to drive carefully so as not to risk his points advantage. And he took advantage of the exit of Lapi and finally the accident of M-Sport’s Adrien Formo to finally finish 5th. Coupled with the 4 points he got with 2nd place in the Power Stage, the Finn extended his lead at the front over Hyundai’s Thunder Neville to 55 points.

What would have been more if Neville hadn’t won the Power Stage and the 5 points of victory as he tried to recover from the transmission problem that had cost him more than 2 minutes earlier in the race but also from the crash that forced him to depart in ED12 on Saturday. As for Evans, the Welshman managed to exit the final Special of Year 3 with 3 points after being left with a broken back suspension on Saturday.

The WRC is now on a three-week break before heading to Kenya for Rally Safari, this year’s 6th World Championship race from June 23rd to 26th.