The gravel portion of the 2022 World Rally Championship season is done. This week’s Rally Spain and November’s season closer in Japan are both on Tarmac, and both present very different challenges.
Spain is often said to be the WRC gets to a racetrack with its smooth roads that require an ultra-precise driving style. And as an ever present on the calendar for years, it’s an event the drivers all know well.
But it’s also a rather unique rally, as the European Rally Championship
Here’s all the key information you need for the penultimate round of this year’s WRC:
Entry breakdown
Total 88 crews
12 Priority 1 crews
32 Priority 2 crews (WRC2)
4 Priority 3 crews (WRC3)
17 Non-priority crews
21 ERC crews
Rally1
Toyota’s is the only unchanged lineup from the last round in New Zealand earlier this month.
New world champion Kalle Rovanperä leads the line alongside Elfyn Evans and the driver he succeeded as world champ, Sébastien Ogier. Takamoto Katsuta will, as always, drive a fourth GR Yaris Rally1 for the Toyota Next Generation concern.
Hyundai will field i20 N Rally1s for Ott Tänak and Thierry Neuville as normal, but welcomes Dani Sordo back into the team for his home round of the championship. Spain was expected to be Sordo’s final appearance of the season but Hyundai’s decision to part ways with Oliver Solberg means Sordo will also drive in Japan.
For the first time since Finland, M-Sport will run five Puma Rally1s in Spain. Craig Breen tops its entry on co-driver Paul Nagle’s WRC swansong, while Gus Greensmith is joined by Adrien Fourmaux in the works lineup – Fourmaux’s first start since Ypres Rally Belgium in August.
Pierre-Louis Loubet returns after his heroics on the Acropolis, while Jourdan Serderidis’ privateer example completes the Rally1 entry.
WRC2
Rally Spain will be a vitally important event in this year’s WRC2 title race, and that’s reflected in the entry. Some 33 Rally2 cars will take the start in Salou, led by Yohan Rossel’s Citroën.
But just as it was in New Zealand, all eyes will be on the fourth seed Kajetan Kajetanowicz to see what he can do to erode Andreas Mikkelsen’s title lead in his adverse strategy to claim the championship.
Emil Lindholm could be a real blocker in that though, as if he can find the finances to contest Japan he also has a shot at winning the title. He of course won in WRC3 last year too during that famous gambit where co-driver Reeta Hämäläinen was registered as the driver.
Teemu Suninen could be another to watch as he continues his search for a first WRC2 win this season 12 months on from joining the Hyundai fold in Spain last year. And there’s plenty of local talent on show too, including Pepe López and Jan Solans.
Nil Solans had been due to take part, but he crashed on his test on Monday, and the damage sustained means he will not be able to start the event.
WRC3
The Junior WRC ended back in Greece, but the other world title available to claim in a Rally3 car, WRC3, reaches its crescendo this weekend in Spain.
Sami Pajari leads the points table but has contested all of his possible rounds (instead driving a Toksport Škoda Fabia Rally2 evo in Spain), leaving it up to Junior WRC sparring partner Lauri Joona and Jan Černý to try and steal the championship from him.
Both Joona and Černý are tied on 86 points, one adrift of Pajari, so if either wins Rally Spain they will win the championship.
That’s therefore the battle to watch, but Diego Dominguez Jr and Zoltán László will be doing their best to muscle their way into the mix.
ERC
2022 champion Efrén Llarena will see out his ERC season on Rally Spain, topping the entry in his MRF-backed Škoda.
His competition will be thin on the ground though with just six Rally2 cars entering the ERC section of the rally, and five of them are Fabios.
Yoann Bonato is the outlier in a C3 Rally2, while Alberto Battistolli and Javier Pardo are other obvious contenders. Former Citroën and Subaru driver Xevi Pons is an intriguing addition too, starting just his second rally all year.
Itinerary
Nineteen special stages totaling 182.5 miles make up this year’s Rally Spain, which is once again based in the PortAventura theme park in Salou.
Aside from shakedown there’s no competitive action on Thursday for just the fourth time this season; instead the rally begins on Friday with the usual cloverleaf loop of four stages repeated in the afternoon.
Saturday is a seven-stage loop with a three-stage loop repeated, before a stage along the Salou seafront in the evening.
Sunday offers just two stages repeated, with the Ruidecanyes test once again hosting the powerstage complete with its famous roundabout.
The ERC section of the event will complete all of Friday and Saturday’s stages, but SS15 Salou will bring the rally to a close.
