Rally Sweden dominated by the rising star from Finland, Tänak and Evans in big trouble

The Swedish Rally was the second event of this season and offered a truly attractive spectacle. The withdrawal of the two big favourites gave room for other drivers, so what is the final standings of the Nordic Rally?

A total of seventeen stages comprised this year’s Swedish rally, which was convincingly dominated by Finnish driver Kalle Rovanperä.

He led from Saturday morning in Sweden, holding the top spot in the standings until the very end. The 21-year-old Finn scored his third career victory and his sixth podium finish.

Rovanperä is a very promising driver and will undoubtedly attack the world championship title this year. Should he manage to reach the very top at the end of the year, he would become the youngest ever champion of the WRC royal category.

“I was the first to start in Sweden, so I didn’t expect to be at the top. The team did a very good job, it was a very tough weekend. I couldn‘t be too happy about the win, given what’s happening in Ukraine,” Rovanperä told WRC.

Second place from the Swedish rally goes to Thierry Neuville, who is considered one of the favourites to win the title. However, he lost twenty-two seconds to the winner of the second round of the season.

This pair of drivers was then joined on the podium by Esapekka Lappi, who shares his car with Sébastien Ogier for this year. The legendary French driver has already withdrawn from the main WRC programme and will therefore only compete in certain events.

The two title contenders, Ott Tänak and Elfyn Evans, are not yet enjoying an ideal start to the season. The former was leading the standings after the opening five stages on Friday. However, he finished the last 10 kilometres of the fifth stage with technical problems on his hybrid power unit, which triggered a red warning light on his car.

Under the new WRC regulations, such a situation requires a team with such a car to retire for safety reasons. The team cannot then touch the car until it is declared safe by the hybrid powertrain supplier Compact Dynamics.

It has been a frustrating start to the season for Hyundai, Tänak would otherwise normally be fighting for the overall championship in Sweden. The reality, however, is that the 2019 world champion is only seventh overall, over 21 minutes behind first-placed Rovanper.

Evans even had to end his Swedish rallying career early. He crashed hard into a patch of snow at the end of stage 16, whereupon he knocked over a photo booth at the finish line. The Welsh driver was subsequently penalised ten seconds.

In addition, he made a mistake in Sunday’s leg that ended his tenure in the Swedish rally. The damage to the front of his car was already too great.

Fourth place overall then goes to Japan’s Katsuta, with Gus Greensmith and his Ford rounding out the top five. The WRC 2 category was dominated by Andreas Mikkelsen with a lead of 23 seconds over second-placed Veiby. First place in WRC 3 belongs to Lauri Joonu.

Sources: WRC, Motorsport