The last three World Rally Championship rounds have been a treat for thrusting thriving talent into the limelight.
Mārtiņš Sesks stunned in Poland in a hybrid-less Rally1 car, and was even better on his home roads of Latvia as he grabbed a pair of stage wins and effortlessly slotted into fighting for the podium places with World Rally champions.
Sami Pajari got his chance in a Rally1-spec Toyota for his home event in Finland and was similarly brilliant – winning just his ninth stage at the top level and eventually finishing fourth overall as one of just two of the five Toyotas not to retire.
In performing so well, both have moved themselves to the front of the queue for any future permanent Rally1 drives – one of them is thought to be all but guaranteed one in the not-too-distant future.
It looks like a question of when, not if, Pajari returns to the wheel of a GR Yaris Rally1
But who made the best impression on their breakthrough WRC event? Was it Pajari or Sesks who had the better debut?
We asked the DirtFish media team for their opinions and perspectives.
Sesks – but Pajari’s the better prospect
I’m sure he’s not particularly worried about it, but I do actually feel sorry for Sami Pajari. Had his Rally1 debut not just followed Mārtiņš Sesks’, the plaudits and hype afterwards would likely have been much higher. Sesks effectively normalized jumping into a Rally1 car and looking like you belong – which is exactly what Pajari also did.
But having said that, Sesks gets the nod for me because of just how unexpected it was.
Realistically, to Pajari’s credit, everyone knew he would cope with the Rally1 challenge well. Sesks was a far bigger curveball. Those who’d monitored his European Rally Championship exploits knew he would be quick, but with the likes of Teemu Suninen and Andreas Mikkelsen talking about the challenge of adapting to the Rally1, nobody could surely have seen Sesks being that good.
Strictly speaking it wasn’t his debut, but Sesks’ speed in Latvia was just awesome. His reaction to losing a podium on the final stage due to a technical problem was even more so. The Latvian went from a driver nobody was talking about to one garnering new fans all over the world – it’s not often either my mom or brother will ask me about new rally drivers, but both sent me messages about Sesks.
But just to deliver one more twist to this tale, for me it’s Pajari who has the bigger future. He’s three years younger, has a lot more WRC experience and is seemingly on a telegraphed path to a Toyota Rally1 drive.
This is not to suggest that Sesks does not deserve another chance, but Pajari is already proven across a range of surfaces. You sense Finland really was the beginning rather than the peak. He doesn’t have many questions left to answer, but Sesks still does after shining on roads he’s always been ballistic on. Prove he’s quick elsewhere and suddenly he’s an irresistible prospect.
Luke Barry
Stakes were far higher for Sesks
Both Sesks and Pajari dazzled on debut. Both laid out a case for why they deserve to be sat in a Rally1 car again in the future. Both over-delivered relative to their experience.
But I have to give this one to Sesks. Their futures were already on different trajectories before either stepped into a Rally1 car for the first time. Pajari’s remains as it was. Sesks’ might have changed because of his star turns in Poland and Latvia.
The stakes were far higher for Sesks than they were for Pajari. Yet it was Pajari who felt the nerves and blinked first with his off on Laukaa – admittedly in very tricky conditions that Sesks didn’t have to face.
Yes, Sesks had a more equitable platform on which to perform: in Poland, some of the field had little to no experience and in Latvia, he knew the roads like no one else. But this was very much an all-or-nothing situation for Sesks. A number of factors had coalesced simultaneously which gave him the chance to be in a Rally1 car. He had two outings to show the world why he deserved to be in the WRC – nothing more. If he failed to make an impression, his best chance of making the final step was unlikely to come again.
His performance under pressure, in front of an expectant home crowd with his entire career as a rally driver on the line, was the most impressive aspect of all.Alasdair Lindsay on Sesks
Consider the pressure of that situation. You want to become a professional rally driver and, one day, fight to become world champion. To do that, you need someone to hire you. And for that, you need a factory team to believe you can deliver. To be blunt: Mārtiņš Sesks was probably not on the shortlist for such a drive anywhere. He had one month, effectively, to capitalize on a potentially once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and demonstrate that he belonged in the WRC.
There’s no doubt that Toyota expects Pajari to deliver in time. They’ve made a bet that he’s going to go far. But as evidenced by how Kalle Rovanperä and Takamoto Katsuta were brought through the ranks, Pajari will be given the time and space to grow.
Sesks had no such luxury. Making up the numbers wasn’t really going to move the needle. He had to nail everything: not only the driving but also showing teams and partners that he was a marketable asset outside of the car as well as in it. With Toyota’s line-up full and Hyundai unlikely to give their third car to someone with as little frontline experience as Sesks, impressing M-Sport and making himself a sponsor’s dream is currently his most obvious pathway to break into the WRC.
Pajari didn’t have to worry about the latter. He knows that if he delivers, there is a pathway to the top level open to him.
Both drivers performed extremely well when thrown in the deep end. The difference is Pajari had a life raft on hand if needed – but if Sesks hadn’t been able to swim, he’d have drowned instead. His performance under pressure, in front of an expectant home crowd with his entire career as a rally driver on the line, was the most impressive aspect of all.
Alasdair Lindsay
They were both as good as each other
I’m no driver, nor am I a qualified journalist, but where I am lucky in this job is I am able to spend a lot of time around some of the stars of the WRC, both on and off camera. From me, you won’t get so much in terms of performance analysis, but more the bigger picture, and a look into their characters. Here goes!
Eliot is the man behind the camera of DirtFish's WRC coverage
To use some youthful words echoed by Colin Clark, Mārtiņš had charm, confidence and ‘rizz’, but more in a sense that the media presence and publicity of his debut was just as important as the performance. The level of production on his Instagram with immense. He was vlogging mid-rally, in the media zones, during service, talking to the camera as if he was an experienced YouTuber getting the opportunity to drive the world’s fastest rally cars.
To be able to engage your personality like that, publicly in front of other drivers and teams whilst in the heat of battle, fighting for what was victory at the time is something we’ve never seen before.
Sami on the surface is quiet, shy, a man of few words. But in recent time’s he’s opened up to us at DirtFish. There’s been regular conversations off camera, but you’d only need to watch our recce interviews, start interviews or bloopers just to see that now he’s willing to bite back at Colin! None more so than in recently in Finland.
Granted, Sesks first stage win didn’t come on his first event like Sami’s, but it’s hard to pick the best reaction out of the two! All I do know is that watching both, it all felt so relatable. And despite having plenty to do, we all stopped and clapped in the Paviljonki press office when Sami grabbed the camera in celebration. A moment you don’t forget. When did we last see a driver grab the camera like that?
But this question highlights a bigger issue which I’m sure we’re all aware of. These two drivers over the last three rallies have engaged a new audience and, importantly, a young one. But I’ve no doubt that there are four or five other drivers who could come in and create similar memories in Rally1 machinery. It’s hard to argue that we couldn’t see this from Solberg in Sweden? Rossel in Monte? Or even Virves in somewhere like Estonia?
Of course we need the old guard, our experienced stars, but the current situation with a lack of seats and opportunity means we are missing out on these feel-good stories being ‘normal’. As someone working in the media but also a young fan new to the modern-day WRC who appreciates a viral clip, a relatable reaction or a ‘drive to survive’ behind the scenes moment, I feel that we owe Mārtiņš and Sami a thank you.
His speed was sublime in Latvia, but Poland was arguably more impressive.David Evans on Sesks
They have brought to light the potential audience this sport is missing out on: its future audience. With that in mind, I can’t pick a winner.
Eliot Barnard
Sesks faced the bigger step up
Long answer short: Mārtiņš Sesks. The Latvian’s pace in the European Rally Championship is well documented, but I don’t think anybody could have seen that speed transferring with such ease to the world stage.
Sesks domination of Rally Latvia/Liepāja for the last two years offered some indication of what he was capable of in his own backyard – but there was still some degree of expectation that the WRC regulars would show him the way home. Not a bit of it. Yes, he knew where he was going, but still Sesks was sublime.
His speed was sublime in Latvia, but Poland was arguably more impressive. Going to Mikołajki without hybrid was a stroke of genius. So few people genuinely knew the precise impact of battery power on a Rally1 car. How much does it complicate the actual process of driving? Being the first in the world to drive a car like this at that level gave Sesks the opportunity to come in under the radar. Yes, his car looked the same as Adrien Fourmaux’s, but he was missing 134bhp off the line and that was undoubtedly going to slow him down.
It did. And it didn’t.
By the time he got home, he knew the car, he knew the chassis and the set-up and he knew where to let those extra 130-odd horses have their heads.
Sesks' drive in Poland without hybrid boost was arguably even more impressive than his podium pace in Latvia
The element of surprise is where, for me, the better impression comes from. Pajari has plied his trade in the world championship for a few years now and the minute he switched from a Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 to Toyota’s second-tier option run by the factory-blessed Printsport squad, the speculation began: his future was safe. The writing on the wall was in Japanese.
This doesn’t diminish what Pajari did in Finland, his result was solid. I’m glad he landed the scratch time, it gets the monkey off his back and demonstrates that he’s got speed as well as good sense.
If anything, I’d say Sesks was the more composed of the two. He made running second and scrapping with an eight-time world champion look enormously ordinary. That made the best of impressions.
David Evans
