Toyota Gazoo Racing World Rally Team have claimed a second successive one-two finish after Kalle Rovanperä stormed to victory ahead of Sébastien Ogier at the FIA World Rally Championship’s first Rally Latvia.
Returning to the high-speed gravel roads where he began his rally career as a teenager, Rovanperä and co-driver Jonne Halttunen led the rally from the opening stage in Riga on Thursday night. They won 11 stages, taking their career tally to more than 200; the result was their 14th victory in their 50th WRC start.
Ogier and co-driver Vincent Landais made an impressive return to action after being forced to miss the previous round in Poland – which made this Ogier’s first fast European gravel rally for almost three years. He was already the top debutant on Latvian soil when he ended Friday in third place, before taking second away from the local favourite Mārtiņš Sesks (M-Sport Ford) on Saturday.
With its one-two result, TGR-WRT took maximum manufacturers’ points from the overall standings plus second and third in the separate Super Sunday classification – where Ogier was denied top spot by just 0.2 seconds. With the Power Stage results also factored in, the team have closed to within one point of the championship lead.
Welshman Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin finished fifth overall on an event where road position was a significant factor. Running second on the road on Friday, Evans still did well relative to his championship rivals and, finishing fourth in the Super Sunday classification, has closed to within 13 points of the series leader.
Takamoto Katsuta and co-driver Aaron Johnston showed confidence and pace from the start of the rally, holding fourth position at the end of Friday before a small overshoot on on the 12th stage caused damage to the power steering system, leaving them sixth at the finish.
There was also a double podium for the Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 in the WRC2 category, with Mikko Heikkilä finishing in second place for Step-Five Motorsport and Sami Pajari third for Printsport after an exciting battle between the two Finnish drivers. Pajari, who won WRC2 on the two previous rounds in Sardinia and Poland, will make his Rally1 debut with TGR-WRT on the next event in Finland.
Afterwards, Elfyn said, “Today was all about trying to get as many extra points as we could. On the whole, it was not going too badly for most of the day, but to just fall short by a few tenths of a second in the Power Stage was annoying.
“At least it’s been a weekend where we gained some points, which is better than nothing. We always want to do better but it’s been a difficult weekend with the road cleaning and we were always a bit on the back foot from there. Now we’ll look forward to Rally Finland which is always an enjoyable event.”