With Rally Portugal complete, the traditional gravel season of the World Rally Championship is now well under way. Portugal delivered drama aplenty, and that theme is likely to continue with the next event: Rally Italy Sardinia.
2024 marks the 20th anniversary of Sardinia joining the WRC calendar and it’s a rally that continues to deliver one of the toughest challenges of the year. Durability is every bit as important as outright speed on this one.
Here are all the details you need to know ahead of this rough, tough and unforgiving event.
Rally Sardinia Entry List
Total 87 crews
8 Rally1 crews
45 Rally2 crews (40 WRC2)
27 Rally3 crews (20WRC3 & 18 JWRC)
Thierry Neuville led a Hyundai one-two on last year's event
Rally1
The Rally1 entry drops back to eight cars as Toyota Gazoo Racing returns to its regular three-car line-up. Kalle Rovanperä will sit this one out and Sébastien Ogier will make his fourth appearance of the season.
Ogier goes into Sardinia off the back of consecutive wins in Croatia and Portugal, making him the only driver with two wins so far this year. Takamoto Katsuta is back on points-scoring duty and, like Elfyn Evans, he will be looking to make up for a disappointing weekend in Portugal.
Hyundai’s full-time line-up of Thierry Neuville and Ott Tänak will again be joined by Dani Sordo. The Spanish part-timer takes to the start for the second time in 2024 and will be ready to assist his team-mates by trying to deny Toyota as many points as possible.
Over at M-Sport, it’s been a season of contrast. Regular duo Adrien Fourmaux, who has displayed a new level of maturity, and Grégoire Munster , who needs to find a way to emulate his team-mate, while once again pilot the Puma Rally1s.
Sébastien Ogier is gunning for a third consecutive WRC rally win
WRC2
The Rally2 entry for Sardinia is even more impressive than it was in Portugal, with 45 crews lining up. Of those runners, 40 are registered for WRC2 points, but there are some key players in the title fight who have elected not to score this time out.
Oliver Solberg and Nikolay Gryazin sit second and third in the championship respectively, but neither will be shooting for points this weekend. Gryazin was the top Rally2 runner in Portugal even though he didn’t score points there either, while Solberg crashed out of the lead in dramatic fashion on the Saturday. The pressure should be off for both drivers, so expect to see them near the front.
It’s championship leader Yohan Rossel that leads the WRC2 field away and, after a strong showing for the Citroën C3 in Portugal, he will be hoping that the improved gravel pace wasn’t a one-off. Rossel is joined by a new co-driver for this one, with Benjamin Boulloud replacing Arnaud Dunand, who contributed to a double penalty for Rossel in Portugal that relegated him to fifth in WRC2.
Nicolas Ciamin is the second of the points-scoring drivers, though he starts behind Solberg and Gryazin. Sardinia will be Ciamin’s fourth WRC2 appearance of the year and, coincidentally, he has finished fourth on each of his starts to date.
The Hyundai is arguably the weakest Rally2 car right now, so Ciamin will have a fight on his hands if he wants to match those around him.
Yohan Rossel will aim to convert renewed gravel pace into points at the finish
Pepe López is up next and will make his second start in a Fiesta Rally2. It was a quick exit for Lopez in Portugal with a roll on just the second stage, so the Spanish driver will be hoping his form is more like it was in a Škoda, where he scored podiums in Monte Carlo and Croatia.
Retirements were very much a theme of WRC2 in Portugal, and Pierre-Louis Loubet and Teemu Suninen start way back in 20th and 21st respectively as they try to recover from a bad start to their year. Sami Pajari was another to go off the road last time out, and he starts behind Lopez in a Toyota GR Yaris.
Portugal was a different story for fellow Toyota pilot Jans Solans, as he took his maiden WRC2 win, also giving the Japanese manufacturer its first victory in the category. He starts 12th on the road, while the man that finished just 3.2-seconds behind him, Josh McErlean, starts all the way back in 26th place in a Škoda Fabia RS Rally2.
Other Škoda drivers include Lauri Joona and three-time European champion Kajetan Kajetanowicz, while Robert Virves makes his first WRC2 appearance of 2024 in another Fabia.
Fiesta-mounted 2023 JWRC champion William Creighton comes into Sardinia off the back off XYZ place on the latest round of the British Rally Championship, the Jim Clark Rally.
Top local interest comes in the form of Roberto Daprà. The 2023 ERC4 champion has graduated to a Škoda Fabia Rally2 Evo for this season and comes to Sardinia having finished ninth and seventh in Portugal and Croatia respectively.
WRC3
Sardinia marks the halfway point in the Junior World Rally Championship season, which means a strong entry of cars. Of 27 Rally3 starters, 20 are registered for WRC3 and 18 for JWRC.
The Renaults of Ghjuvanni Rossi and Mattéo Chatillon lead the field. Rossi finished fifth in Portugal, while Chatillon was second in WRC3 in both Portugal and Croatia (and second Rally3 car on the Monte), so he will no doubt be hoping that three twos add up to one this time.
Peruvian Eduardo Castro is third on the road in a Fiesta Rally3 and makes his first European start of 2024, having already won two rallies at home this year.
Romet Jürgenson leads the JWRC standings after winning in Croatia
Romet Jürgenson starts fourth and is the first JWRC driver. He leads the championship after winning in Croatia and finishing second in Sweden. Mille Johansson is currently second in the championship having won in Sweden. He is not going to Sardinia however, instead electing to contest the Swedish championship Rally Uppland as part of a mixed 2024 campaign.
A trio of JWRC drivers start behind Jürgenson. His fellow FIA Rally Star Taylor Gill, third in the championship, is ahead of 2023 ERC junior champion Norbert Maior, with 2022 British junior champion Eamonn Kelly next. Raúl Hernández rounds out the top ten.
Rally Italia Sardegna itinerary
Sardinia has a dramatically different look for 2024, with a much shorter Friday contributing to a route that now features just 165 competitive miles instead of the 199 miles of last year. The stage count has also dropped from 19 to 16 as a result.
Shakedown takes place on Friday morning with action for real getting under way in the afternoon. There are two shoot loops of two stages, covering 48 miles, starting with Osilu – Tergo at almost 16 miles. This is followed by the eight-mile Sedini – Castelsardo test, before a 40-minute regroup in Castelsardo. With no service or tire-fitting zone between, tire preservation might be the order of the day.
A shortened route should make for intense competition
Fewer miles on Friday ensures that Saturday is the longest day of the rally, with 93 miles across eight stages. The morning starts with the 7.5-mile Tempio Pausania, before the crews take on the 14-mile Tula test. Rather than waiting until the afternoon to repeat those, they are run again after a short regroup in Tempio Pausania, 64 miles from the host town of Alghero.
After a tire-fitting zone (but again, no midday service), the afternoon follows a similar format, with two stages run twice. The 15.7 miles of Monte Lerno – Monti di Ala kicks off the afternoon, before the drivers move on to the nine-mile Coiluna – Loelle 1. These are repeated following another regroup, before the crews head back to the service park.
Sunday is the shortest day at just 22.6 miles across four stages. This is based on the traditional two-loops-of-two stages, but there is a regroup between each test, giving crews time to pause and reflect on their Super Sunday strategies.
The day begins with a blast through the 7.8-mile Cala Flumini stage, followed by the warm-up run through the 4.4-mile Sassari – Argentiera. These two are repeated in the same order, meaning that drivers looking to score maximum powerstage points will need to muster every last ounce of performance through those final 4.4 miles.
