Even for Jari-Matti Latvala, this is a bit much. Lancia? Couple of Stratoses and a Delta do you? Alongside a pair of three-liter Porsches, a trio of screaming E30s and an RS1800. Nice.
And at the head of the top-10 starters for this weekend’s European Historic Championship opener? J-ML’s own works-liveried Toyota Celica Turbo 4WD.
No wonder he’s smiling.
The Finn’s been waiting for this moment for a while. Most pertinently since October’s World Motor Sport Council, which delivered the news that cars built between 1991 and the end of 1999 were now welcome to take to the FIA-officiated series and stages once more.
“We were building this car waiting for this moment,” said Latvala. “It’s really nice that it’s here now. When I stopped competing full-time [in the WRC] and when I took this job as the team principal with Toyota, I always said I wanted to keep on driving.
Latvala's already driven his Celica in competition this year at Arctic Lapland Rally
“I didn’t know if I would be able to compete in a championship again, so this is really exciting. We start in Spain on the Tarmac and do some very nice rallies. And, of course, we are going to see some incredible cars.”
He’s not wrong. The quality talked about at the top of this story continues throughout the Rally Costa Brava entry list.
Seb Perez’s Stratos stopped the Roger Albert Clark Rally in its tracks in 2023 – there’s two more out this weekend. And 911s are everywhere, as are the ubiquitous Escorts of all flavors. There’s nothing new with metal like that competing in historics, it’s Group A where the fascination can be found in the shape of latter-day Legacys, Lancers and, of course, the Impreza 555.
Based out of Girona, the season starts with a tricky 15-kilometer stage in the dark on Thursday night. After that, there’s two full days on the famous Costa Brava Tarmac. In total, 13 stages and 151 competitive kilometers sit in wait.
And across the season, a further nine rallies will help decide this year’s Historic title winner. From Spain, the calendar moves on to Czech for Historic Vltava Rally, then Antibes, Ypres, Weiz, Lahti, Acropolis, Elba, Asturias and the finale in Fafe. Crews will count their best six scores and all-but two of the rounds run on asphalt (Lahti and the Historic Acropolis are the only gravel events).
This week marks the start of a new, old adventure. And nobody could be happier about that than Latvala who’ll be co-driven by Janni Hussi.
