Ask a Finn and they’ll probably tell you the fairytale script is already written. An imperious Kalle Rovanperä is marching towards a first World Rally Championship title and with it, surely, will come the first Rally Finland win.
That is, after all, what happened with Marcus Gronhölm, the most recent World Rally champion hailing from Finland, back in the year 2000.
The omens are good. Toyota was dominant in Estonia. Rovanperä is on a remarkable run of form with five wins from the last six rallies.
But hold your horses. Elfyn Evans is also in a Toyota. He may have gone head-to-head against Rovanperä for the victory four times this year (Sweden, Portugal, Kenya, Estonia) and been beaten each time, but last year in Finland it was Evans atop the podium.
Rovanperä, meanwhile, dipped his Yaris too deep into a cut, causing a pendulum effect when the oversteer was corrected that put him into a large pile of gravel and out of the rally.
That win one year ago must give Evans a confidence boost that this is the place he’ll finally end Rovanperä’s dominant streak?
He believes otherwise.
“At the end of the day, it’s completely different circumstances now. It’s not worth that much,” Evans told DirtFish.
He’s right. There’s a big difference between a Yaris WRC and a GR Yaris Rally1. Plus, Rovanperä has seemingly found another gear since last October.
“We know last year we had such a great feeling with the car, the confidence was high and it clicked,” said Evans.
“And that was it. It came really easily in fact. When you look back, specifically back to my powerstage from Finland, I really didn’t do anything special and yet it was a convincing win.
“When you have weekends like that, where everything just comes together, we want to try and recreate it this year if we can but it’s not always possible going back every year.”
Evans’ stage times on the Friday morning of Rally Estonia, when it was mostly dry and before the rutted, slippery conditions that featured for the rest of the event set in, suggested he was about to recreate it.
He didn’t feel it was quite the same as during his Finland win – but it was reasonably close.
“The feeling was good but I didn’t set off Friday with a great feeling, especially in that first one. At least the car was giving a similar level of confidence to what I had in Finland at that time.”
