Hayden Paddon kicks off the defense of his European Rally Championship crown this weekend as more than 50 ERC-registered competitors tackle Rally Hungary.
Only five of last year’s events retain their place on the eight-round 2024 ERC calendar. And while Rally Hungary is one of them, it will still be all-new for the crews heading into this weekend’s Veszprém-based event. Gone are the asphalt stages of the previous four editions as Rally Hungary heads on to the loose for 120 miles of gravel stages.
Paddon will lead the crews off in his BRC Racing-run Hyundai i20 N Rally2. “I’m looking forward to getting the new season under way, and obviously Rally Hungary is a brand-new rally for us,” he said.
Paddon starts 2024 as the ERC's number one
“We’re pretty comfortable with the car and gravel, so the goal is to put together a strong result. If we can start the championship with a podium, then the target has a minimum. But obviously, we’ll be going there to put our best foot forward and be as competitive as we can.
“We’re expecting probably tougher competition than last year, you know, everyone’s upping their game. Particularly I think Mads Østberg will be the key person to watch. He’s competed in the Hungarian Championship quite a lot, so he knows the roads and he has a good package this year.”
Paddon’s fellow one-time world rally winner Østberg won last year’s season finale in Hungary, albeit when it was a Tarmac event, and was Hungarian champion in 2022, which could give the Citroën C3 driver a crucial advantage in the conditions.
Østberg will aim to benefit from his Hungarian championship experience
Another likely title contender is Latvian Mārtiņš Sesks. Last year’s ERC runner-up won two of the four gravel rounds of the 2023 championship and will be one of three drivers giving the Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 its ERC debut this weekend. The others are Mikko Heikkilä – who was denied victory on last year’s season-opening Rally Serras de Fafe by a final-stage puncture – and Filip Mareš.
Neither Sesks nor Mareš have yet competed in the Toyota, but this will be Heikkilä’s fifth event in the car. He won last month’s opening round of the Italian gravel championship but crashed out of the second-round last weekend while battling for the lead.
As ever, the Škoda Fabia is the most popular car on the entry list. Efrén Llarena, 2022 champion, is seeking to bounce back from a difficult title defense in which he recorded only one podium finish and could do no better than seventh on the gravel rounds.
Mathieu Franceschi, Simon Wagner and Erik Cais are also Fabia RS-mounted, along with Mikołaj Marczyk and Andrea Mabellini. Among the home contingent, Miklós Csomós leads the way in the older Fabia Rally2 evo.
Seventh on Rally Hungary last year, Erik Cais is seeking a maiden ERC podium
There is only one Ford Fiesta Rally2 driver among the top 20 seeds for Rally Hungary – that of Jon Armstrong, who steps up to a full season aboard M-Sport’s Rally2 machine after winning ERC3 last year aboard a Fiesta Rally3.
ERC Junior also kicks off its season on Rally Hungary, with a 17-strong entry of Rally4 cars. Leading the way is Timo Schulz (Opel Corsa), the highest-placed (fourth) in last year’s championship of the returning drivers. Mille Johansson, winner of the opening JWRC round in a Fiesta Rally3, joins Schulz in the Opel camp.
Mattia Zanin and Max McRae are both back for a second crack at the Junior title, McRae switching from Opel power to a Peugeot 208 which is also Zanin’s weapon of choice.
Max McRae is swapping Opel Corsa for Peugeot 208
In addition to the revised calendar – which also welcomes Estonia back to the schedule, brings British representation in the form of Rali Ceredigion and ends in Poland with the asphalt-based Rally Silesia – a key change in ERC this year comes with the qualifying stage.
Qualifying times on the pre-event shakedown were previously used to allow drivers to select their preferred position on the opening-leg road order. Now the times will set the order directly, with fastest qualifier opening the road on asphalt events but with the top 15 going in reverse-order on gravel rallies.
Rally Hungary begins with a quickfire superspecial taking place at the Veszprém Arena on Friday evening. Two loops of three repeated stages make up Saturday’s action, and it’s a similar story on Sunday.
