All was going to plan for Oliver Solberg after Saturday’s midday service on Rally Chile. He led the WRC2 category, the result he needs to become WRC2 category champion this weekend. Then a slow puncture forced him to stop and change a wheel on stage 11.
Suddenly, the championship battle has been blown wide open. But it’s a bizarre title battle: one of the protagonists is present yet not competing, and the other two are team-mates who could end up putting each other out of the title race.
Solberg could still be champion on Monday. Or he could open the door wide open for Sami Pajari, who’s currently pedalling a factory Rally1 car in Chile instead of fighting for second division honors. Or one of the Citroën factory drivers could drag themselves back into unexpected title contention.
It’s messy and complicated. So we’ve broken it all down here.
What Solberg must do
Going into Chile, Solberg’s situation was clear: win and the job is done:
Mathematically speaking, it’s simple. In practical terms, it’s an extremely tall order. Victory puts all of this to bed and Solberg wins the title. The problem is he’s a minute off the lead with only 33.5 miles of stages to go – an insurmountable gap without several rivals running into late trouble.
There are two headaches for Solberg, neither of which he can do anything about if victory is out of the question.
Firstly, if Pajari wins Japan (which is expected to be his last of seven WRC2 points-scoring events) after Solberg doesn’t get the job done in Chile, the Finn clinches the title. And Solberg isn’t allowed to enter and score points to prevent Pajari from achieving that outcome.
The other problem is the two Citroëns. In any tiebreak scenario, Solberg would lose to Yohan Rossel or Nikolay Gryazin if he ended up tied on points with either of them (Gryazin on number of wins, Rossel on worst result – more on that later).
Based on his comments at the end of Saturday, he’s not going to bank points and hope for the best. It’s full speed ahead to try and secure the title on his own terms.
When asked by DirtFish what his plan for Sunday was, Solberg responded: “Go absolutely flat out tomorrow and hopefully catch the podium, and then a little bit of luck and everything is possible.
“It’s been such a good year and consistent and fast and winning a lot of rallies and everything, so it’s a little bit disappointing when it’s such a s*** thing.”
Citroën has two chances but can shoot itself in the foot
Between Rossel and Gryazin, Citroën has two drivers still in title contention – though they’re both long shots.
Improved pace on gravel has kept Rossel in the title race – second place in Sardinia and this in Greece were crucial for his championship aspirations. He needs to outscore Solberg by 10 points in Chile to keep his hopes alive – after Saturday’s action that gap was only three points.
If Gryazin wins in Chile and Solberg can only muster fourth place, that gives Gryazin the 13-point boost over Solberg he needs to stay in the title race himself. But if Solberg were to reduce that to 12 or less, it’s game over for Gryazin.
This is where Citroën’s situation gets complicated. Gryazin leads overnight heading into Sunday with Rossel third, albeit only 1.6s behind second-placed Gus Greensmith and with a pending stewards’ appeal to get some time back after following Solberg’s dust on SS11. Meanwhile Rossel is 18.4s behind Gryazin. If Solberg were to move into third, Gryazin would be counted out of the fight – but with Rossel able to stay in contention if the Citroëns were to swap places.
Team orders are unlikely to be played by DG Sport, the outfit that runs Citroën’s de facto WRC2 works squad. If Rossel wants to keep himself in the hunt, he’s going to have to catch his team-mate on pace alone.
“I think no,” responded Rossel when asked if Citroën would deploy team orders in such a situation. “I don’t know. It’s not my job. We are two official drivers for sure.
“I don’t think about that for the moment. I hope [for] another time [for SS11], good sleep and after, come back tomorrow because I think it will be very difficult conditions.”
Rossel will end his season on CER, his seventh and final outing of the season. He’d undoubtedly be the favorite to win given his asphalt prowess and relative lack of depth to the WRC2 field that weekend. If he does end up taking only 10 points out of Solberg, he’d need to win and then tie on points – but would win on countback given his fifth place in Portugal compared to Solberg’s DNF on the same rally.
As for Gryazin, if Sunday finishes as it starts, he’d need to take maximum points in both CER and Japan, in which case he’d then win on countback by having four wins to Solberg’s three.
What about Pajari?
All the while one title protagonist can only watch on as the other contenders fight among themselves. With Solberg in trouble and unlikely to win as it stands, it’s now Pajari who is likely to end up with the simplest job – turn up to Japan and win.
If he does that, neither Citroën driver can beat him regardless of their results in Chile and the two subsequent rallies. And if Solberg doesn’t win in Chile, he’s powerless to stop Pajari. The current points leader’s only option would be to sit and wait, hoping Pajari fails to surpass him.
