Andreas Mikkelsen finds himself back in a familiar position: seeking a Rally2 program in order to stay sharp in case any manufacturers need him at the top of the World Rally Championship.
Mikkelsen’s experienced this journey twice before – first when Volkswagen suddenly departed the WRC after 2016 and he was left without a drive; then after his new employer Hyundai let him go after 2019, he won the WRC2 title twice to earn a comeback in 2024.
But that comeback was only a partial season, almost exclusively on asphalt as Mikkelsen shared an i20 N Rally1 with team-mates Esapekka Lappi and Dani Sordo.
Hyundai elected to sign a permanent driver for its third car in 2025, Adrien Fourmaux, and Mikkelsen was left standing in Casino Square last month without a rally car to get into.
“I’m still working on a program,” he assured DirtFish. “For sure Rally1 will be difficult, there’s not so many seats available so Rally2 maybe, but when I start or exactly my program I don’t know, I’m working on it.”
Mikkelsen’s aim is simply to “stay in the game” with an eye on the change in technical regulations for 2027, which will hopefully entice new manufacturers to join the championship.
“I would for sure prefer to do WRC2, stay in the game,” he said.
“One thing that’s important is 2027: hopefully new manufacturers, more seats available – right now it’s really tough. So I still want to keep active and aim for ’27 basically.”
Why didn’t Hyundai work out?
A crash in Central Europe typified what was a difficult 2024 for Mikkelsen
Mikkelsen had the chance to drive for M-Sport Ford full-time in 2024, but instead opted for Hyundai and the part-time program it was offering.
That in itself might not have been such a bad thing, but the Tarmac rounds (Monte Carlo, Croatia, Central Europe and Japan) plus a gravel outing on one of Mikkelsen’s favorite events, Poland, were all that was available.
And with such large gaps between most of those rallies, acclimatizing quickly was a challenge.
“I didn’t get the rallies that I really wanted to do,” Mikkelsen confessed. “Doing the Tarmac rounds… we can deliver good results on Tarmac but it doesn’t come as naturally to me as gravel.
“Pretty much on gravel I can jump straight into the car and deliver good results – you saw it in Poland, with only one test day we were leading.
“But if I could do something different I would probably push more from the beginning of the season,” he added, “because I really wanted to use Monte Carlo and Croatia just to learn the car, get to the finish, get the miles because if I didn’t finish this Monte Carlo Rally there’s then three months with no driving when you get to Croatia and you have to learn the car from the beginning there.
A lack of seat time made life difficult last year
“Then I only had two more events in Central Europe and Japan where we tried to focus on pushing, driving fast. Yeah… maybe I could try to explore and push a bit more from the beginning, but the team also asked me to take my time and build step by step.”
At the time, Mikkelsen being used as Hyundai’s ‘asphalt specialist’ seemed strange, but “that’s what I was offered” and in his situation you don’t turn down the chance to drive for a manufacturer team in a Rally1 car.
“Nobody wanted to do Tarmac,” Mikkelsen revealed, “and it’s not an easy car to drive on Tarmac, the Hyundai. But of course in my position you have to take whatever comes; even though it’s not my preferred surface and everything, it’s time in a Rally1 car and with the top boys, but I just hope, or I would like to have a little bit more time in the car looking back at last year.
“Because you did one test day before Monte Carlo, that’s it. Then a three month gap to Croatia, very little time in the car. I was at their test track, but you don’t really learn the car there at all.
“So yeah I would definitely do it again, but let’s try to add let’s say small rallies – more time in the car would be preferable.”
