Ott Tänak has admitted his Hyundai team-mate Thierry Neuville’s single-season extension is a cause for concern at the Korean firm’s commitment to the World Rally Championship moving forwards.
Announced on Thursday morning, Neuville’s new deal is for 2025 only – whereas his previous contract was for three seasons. DirtFish has sought comment on the thinking behind that from Hyundai Motorsport president Cyril Abiteboul.
Asked directly if he was concerned about the length of Neuville’s agreement, Tänak told DirtFish: “I mean, yeah, I guess. All the future anyway is quite open. So, yeah, let’s see how the sport generally develops. And hopefully, if we all together improve, then everything’s possible.”
Tänak confirmed he was already under contract with Hyundai for 2025, but little is known about the future beyond the end of next year.
Previously, Hyundai had committed to the WRC until the end of the current homologation cycle which would have carried it through 2025 and ’26. Sources inside the team are now accepting Hyundai’s time as a WRC factory team will be up in 16 months.
Talking more broadly about the next raft of technical regulations, Tänak underlined the importance of those 2027 rules, adding: “For all of us, it’s extremely important now to do right decisions and put everything on track. I mean, yeah, it’s nothing bad to say. At the moment, already with the promotion side, things are improving step by step. So, definitely we need quite many more steps.
“But still, all together, you know, sometimes putting some people on the back foot, you know, it can help everything all together.”
Tänak starts this week’s Acropolis Rally Greece 31 points behind his series leading team-mate Neuville. The 2019 world champion has endured a tough run of results recently, crashing heavily on two of his last three rallies.
Tänak is looking forward to the coming rallies, starting with this weekend's Acropolis Rally Greece
“The car didn’t let me down and it was my own mistakes,” he said. “Probably I just ran out of talent, you know, and on that speed… But anyhow, these things happen and they’ve happened before in my career and it’s been just unfortunate [there have been] a few too many this year.
“Now we arrive to a different characteristic [of event] again. Normally in these conditions the car has been performing well and I definitely feel better in the car than I felt in the last couple of rallies.
“I was really happy to stay one week more home than I would normally do and yeah, definitely nice to recharge and you know, to be full of energy coming back.”
