Nobody truly knew what to expect from Jon Armstrong ahead of his first season as a Rally1 driver in the World Rally Championship.
He’d ended the European Rally Championship super strongly with back-to-back wins and a second place at Barum Rally Zlín, but how would that Fiesta Rally2 pace translate to a Puma Rally1?
Well, it transpired.
The 31-year-old was third overall just two stages into his top-flight career and strutted his stuff again in Croatia with nine top-three times, third on Super Sunday and the powerstage and an SS3 time just 0.1s short of a maiden stage win.
A headline result hasn’t landed yet, and Armstrong has made mistakes at all four events so far. But that’s OK when he’s putting his M-Sport Ford firmly in the fight with the Hyundais and demonstrating both its, and his, potential.
Armstrong gets a big thumbs up for the potential he's shown thus far
But how does Armstrong feel about his trajectory relative to his own pre-season expectations?
“It’s difficult to answer that one,” he told DirtFish.
“The times that we’ve shown are maybe better than what we could expect this far into being in a Rally1 car. Some drivers have been here for a very long time and it’s taken them longer to maybe get to where we are. But at the same time you can get quite stuck at a level, so it’s important not to sort of plateau and to sort of keep pushing to improve.”
In one sentence, Armstrong outlined his ambition. It’s important not to plateau.
He’s made a good start, but he doesn’t want to settle for that.
“I’m quite pleased with our pace,” he added. “OK if we could be more consistent with some of the pace and then get an overall result that would be better for us. There’s been a chance to have quite a few strong results this year that we haven’t capitalised on, but I’m sure we can get there if we keep trying.”
Despite the clear positives with his pace, Armstrong views Croatia as a missed opportunity – especially considering how the rally panned out with six of the nine Rally1 cars finishing outside the top-10.
“The pace that we have in Croatia with the Puma and the cars around us has been really encouraging,” he reflected.” OK, today [Sunday] is a wee bit more smooth and racetrack like but actually our times have been still quite good.
“Elfyn and Oliver were pushing very hard for those extra points. When you compare us to the Hyundais, I think it looks really, really good. The Toyotas, as we’ve seen last year in Canaries, are in a bit of a league of their own when it comes to smooth Tarmac with this tire. Yeah… we’ll just try to keep improving.
“But overall, it’s sort of a story of what could have been. If we had instead been a little bit more clean and kept our nose clean, we might have got a podium here, which is crazy to think. But that’s rallying. And loads of other people had issues. Even right to the last stage, there’s been loads of drama. So it’s been a bit of a crazy rally, but I guess good to follow for everyone.”
Armstrong's 12th place in the championship doesn't reflect his speed. He wants to change that
It’s clear Armstrong is keen to get a result on the board to demonstrate his progress. He revealed his next target is a top-five.
“We’ve showed some good pace on the first four events and we know some small areas where we want to keep improving, so we’ll just try to focus on those and work as a team,” he explained.
“If we can keep our nose more clean on the next rallies, then I think our next target is to try and get a top-five and just make the pace more and more consistent, which I’m confident we can do.”
Armstrong has more experience than most of his rivals at next week’s Rally Islas Canarias, with three previous starts in Rally4, Rally3 and Rally2 machinery.
To read more in-depth thoughts from Armstrong on his 2026 season so far and where he can improve, join Club DirtFish.
