Teemu Suninen scored his first European Rally Championship victory on Rally Poland, keeping local stars at bay and extending his points leader over Lancia’s Andrea Mabellini.
Rally Poland wasn’t expected to be Suninen’s strong suit; for 2026 Rally Silesia, which featured on the ERC calendar in 2024, took over the national moniker from the previous fast gravel event that was historically based out of Mikołajki.
That shift put 2024 Czech champion Dominik Stříteský among the favourites for victory and the Škoda driver won the qualifying stage on Friday. But he crashed on SS3, running wide into slippery grass and crashing head-on into a tree, destroying his Fabia RS Rally2.
Stříteský remains in hospital for further examination, while co-driver Ondřej Krajča has already been discharged from hospital; stage three was cancelled after his accident.
Suninen did not relinquish the rally lead after taking it from Jakub Matulka on SS4
Suninen moved into the lead of the rally on the next stage, usurping reigning Polish national champion and fellow Škoda runner Jakub Matulka; the first pass of Gmina Jasienica was number one of five stage wins during the rally that helped him to carve out a 9.7s margin of victory of Matulka by the finish.
His lead over Mabellini is now up to 23 points with 105 left to score this year and marks the second of four rallies in a five week period; he will travel straight to Finland to test for the Secto Labs team ahead of WRC Rally Finland, where he mathematically remains a top contenders for the WRC2 title.
As Suninen edged further ahead at the front of the field in Poland, Matulka was left to fend off Mabellini and reigning champion Miko Marczyk for the second step of the podium. By the end of Saturday’s action the trio were covered by only 2.3s but three stage wins on Sunday allowed Matulka to pull ahead and clinch a career-first ERC podium.
Marczyk and Mabellini swapped places repeatedly during the final day, with the home hero ultimately doing enough on the final loop to fend off Mabellini for the first podium finish of his title defence. Mabellini won the powerstage but with Marczyk second-quickest, the Lancia driver fell 2.6s short of taking third place.
Marczyk is 33 points behind Suninen in the title race; Poland was his first top-five finish of the season
Three-time European champion Kajetan Kajetanowicz made his first ERC start in nine years on his home round and ultimately couldn’t keep pace with the front-runners, finishing fifth and 41.5s off the leading pace.
William Creighton had held fifth early doors but overshot a junction on the second pass of Ochaby, losing 13.8s and falling to ninth. That promoted WRC2 regular Marco Bulacia to sixth, followed home by 19-year-old rising star Adrian Rzeźnik and 2024 Polish champion Jarosław Szeja in seventh and eighth.
Ninth place finished in a dead-heat: Creighton finished level on overall time with MRF-shod Erik Cais but gets ninth-placed points on countback thanks to being faster on the rally’s opening stage.
