All victories in the World Rally Championship are worth the same 25 points, but victory at Rally Portugal meant far more to Hyundai Motorsport than its championship ramifications.
It was confirmation, to every individual within the organization, that they could still do it.
The car was far more competitive than it had been anywhere else in 2026 – a Hyundai driver was in the top three after every single stage of the event – and Thierry Neuville swooped in when trouble befell Sébastien Ogier to take victory by 16.3 seconds.
“Portugal is a very important one for the team,” Neuville told DirtFish. “It shows that we can still win and it gives a good confidence boost for the team.
“For me myself personally, the most important was to see that on a regular basis we were able to fight at the front and the performance was there throughout the whole weekend.
“Also that we were able to somehow build and manage our weekend because if you don’t have that feeling and the performance it needs to manage your weekend, usually it doesn’t work.”
The added importance was the emotional impact of Croatia. When Neuville made a mistake and retired from the powerstage while leading by over a minute, Hyundai hearts were broken. But Neuville and co-driver Martijn Wydaeghe managed to turn that pain into an eventual gain.
“Like I said, they [the team] needed that confirmation that we are still capable of winning,” Neuville added, “and it should give a good confidence boost for everybody in the team because, you know, when you work hard and sometimes things don’t go your way, or go even the wrong way, you can question yourself.
“And I think a lot of people have been struggling with that, but it should be a little confirmation for them that, yeah, if we get the things right and we work constructively, we can have a package which is competitive.”
Hyundai sporting director Andrew Wheatley confessed the team was “lucky” Ogier had his puncture, but also unlucky in what happened to Adrien Fourmaux – collecting a double puncture after going off road on SS8 while Oliver Solberg made the same mistake but escaped with just a slow puncture.
Wheatley felt Hyundai had "half a chance" of winning Portugal before the event
“After Croatia, I felt that there was an opportunity for us to come back,” Wheatley told DirtFish. “And when you’ve had a negative, when you get the positive, it tastes better.
“But we also knew that two weeks later we were going to Canary Islands where, honestly, it was about managing expectation and making sure everybody didn’t put their heads down because we knew that Canaries was going to be tough.
“But we also knew that coming here, if we had a normal Portugal, we had half a chance. And we haven’t had a normal Portugal. This is quite unusual, but we’ve been lucky.
“I think we’ve been a little unlucky because Adrien could also have been knocking on the door. But he’s got a good result and a lot of points from today, so hopefully we can take that and go forward.”
