Winning is not the only way to claim the ultimate goal, but it’s an obsession that drives this young Swede.
“The day you see Calle Carlberg smiling with a P2, you should call a doctor,” he once remarked.
There’s something quite Sébastien Ogier-esque in his thirst for victory. Simply nothing else will do – and it shows in his results.
In his last 10 rallies – driving a range of Rally4, Rally3 and Rally2 machinery – he’s won seven of them, finished second in two more (by only 2.4s and 3.4s) and the one he failed to reach the podium was due to a mechanical problem, and he walked away with a championship title that weekend anyway!
In this context, it’s no surprise Calle Carlberg emerged from the opening round of the 2026 Junior WRC – last weekend’s Rally Sweden – as the winner.
Carlberg won Rally Sweden in Junior WRC by almost two minutes
But what he absolutely wasn’t was some sort of local expert.
“People might believe I have a lot of experience on snow, but it was only my second ever snow or ice rally,” Carlberg told DirtFish. “And also my second time in a four-wheel drive car. We did, I think, 30 kilometers of testing in the car before, so it was like a shakedown on stage one and two.”
Ali Türkkan, a title contender in 2025, took the early lead but by stage four Carlberg and co-driver Jørgen Eriksen had moved ahead, and never budged. They eventually beat second-placed Leevi Lassala by 1m52.5s.
“I think I could dream of a result like this, but I didn’t believe that it would happen,” the Swede smiled.
“I thought ‘OK, maybe top three is possible’. But after, I would say, stage two, where I saw I was there, and I was not happy about either the setup or my driving, I knew that, OK, maybe a good result is possible. And yeah, we managed to do something great.”
Some click changes and roll bar tweaks allowed Carlberg to bed himself into the Rally3 on his first rally start in one.
Small tweaks enabled Carlberg to find the confidence he needed
“With great help from the engineers from M-Sport Poland, also some engineers here from Sweden, I asked some questions and they helped me quite a lot,” he said. “So the car is not perfect yet, but it looks like it’s good enough at least.”
One World Rally Championship event is too early to judge a driver, but it’s enough to leave an impression.
Carlberg had all the hallmarks of someone who should succeed in Junior WRC. He’s following the same path as last year’s champion Mille Johansson – who won Junior ERC to earn the Junior WRC prize and then made full use of it – totally dominated Junior ERC (widely regarded as the world’s most competitive front-wheel-drive series) in 2025 and at 25 years old has good rallying, and life, experience.
And the week before Rally Sweden, Carlberg made his Rally2 (and four-wheel-drive) debut and led into the final stage before being pipped by Kalle Gustafsson who’d driven his Ford Fiesta Rally2 since 2023 – and the older-generation R5 since 2021.
But there was no need to call the doctor – this was a great result, but not one that satisfied Carlberg.
Now he's won one rally, the plan is to win all five
The same mentality is being taken into Junior WRC. Asked which other rallies he’s targeting to win, he grinned and delivered a predictable answer.
“All of them!”
He added: “When it starts like this, there is no other thing to look at. I think we are trying to go for the win in every rally.
“And of course, the championship is the most important to continue this prize drive but for me, you know, to go to a rally and to expect to be second is not my way.”
