The South American leg of this year’s World Rally Championship is done, and the finish line is nearing.
While we’re still not sure where that finish line will actually be, Rally Chile nevertheless played a pivotal role in understanding who’s best positioned to reach it first – as the championship battle concertinaed yet again!
It also taught us that two drivers in particular are in need of a hard reset.
Here’s what we learned from Rally Chile 2026:
Solberg a huge championship player again
Oliver Solberg was adamant pre-event that he maintained a chance of winning the championship. And that’s exactly the right mindset to have: until it’s mathematically impossible, you don’t give up.
Just look how it all changed at the weekend.
Solberg was on course to eat into Elfyn Evans’ advantage anyway, but the Welshman’s puncture on the penultimate stage – and a 34-point score from a possible of 35 – enabled Solberg to slash 20 points out of Evans and close to just 21 points off the lead.
Very much a contender, indeed.
As for Evans, he still leads the way but the result, clearly, could have been better. The saving grace, though, is that Sami Pajari was off-color relative to recent events, so only managed to take three points out of his lead.
Toyota’s esteemed place in WRC history
Toyota has now won all six of the last six manufacturers’ championships, unbeaten since 2020.
Since returning to the championship in 2017 as Toyota Gazoo Racing, the marque has missed out on only three manufacturers’ titles.
And now in historical terms, it is level with Lancia on 10 world titles with a very clear opportunity to make that 11 in 2027.
We know how good the team is in its current guise – winning an 11th event from 12 so far in 2026, meaning it can break another WRC record if it wins the two final rallies of the season – but it’s important in life to take a step back and consider these moments in time.
With comfortably more event victories (116) than any other manufacturers, and now as many world titles, is Toyota now the best brand to ever compete in this sport?
Neuville’s struggles laid bare
As team-mate Adrien Fourmaux continues to wring every single tenth of a second out of his Hyundai, Thierry Neuville can’t keep up.
Why? He entered the weekend talking about his preference for a stiff car; a setup that doesn’t work with the ‘Evo’ version of the i20.
“Sometimes I can feel good on testing, but every time I come to the rally, I feel not comfortable in the car and don’t get from the car what I expect from the car in terms of reactivity and precision especially, and in terms of grip as well,” he said.
“I’ve always driven quite stiff. Now we have a super soft car to find some grip, but it’s just hard for me to be as aggressive with the car. I probably have a bit smoother driving style and that works not that well.”
The end result? Neuville’s Chile was peaky – winning SS3 but behind Fourmaux on every single stage, and then his rally ended spectacularly with a multiple roll in fifth gear on Saturday morning.
The positive is Neuville’s only got two more rallies in this car before he’s set free for a new challenge, whatever that new challenge may be.
Lappi’s offbeat send-off
Hyundai couldn’t have known Hayden Paddon would be quite that good in Paraguay.
It also had reason to believe Esapekka Lappi was the smart choice for Chile, considering he’d done the rally thrice before and neither Paddon, nor Dani Sordo, had ever.
And, Andrew Wheatley revealed, the team wanted to give Lappi a more fitting conclusion to his Hyundai career than a stage four crash on his home event.
Sadly, this wasn’t really much better.
Things did improve over the course of the weekend, but the situation was fairly desperate after Friday, as Lappi was 1m46s down on his leading team-mate Fourmaux.
Poor road position then negatively impacted Lappi, but he eventually finished sixth – 4m34.4s behind Fourmaux. Beating the Frenchman isn’t his job, but if this is to be the end for Lappi in the WRC, it was a lackluster way for an accomplished career to end.
Katsuta and Armstrong in the same slump
Needing a clean weekend after problems on both Friday and Sunday in Paraguay, a mistake was the last thing required.
For Takamoto Katsuta, read Jon Armstrong.
The two drivers are at different stages of their career, but find themselves caught in a similar slump. Both were under clear instruction from their respective teams to produce a clean weekend, and neither managed.
Katsuta’s now down to sixth in the championship as a result, while the pressure is increasing on Armstrong to deliver in Sardinia with his future not yet established. The speed is there, but he needs a result on the board,
WRC2 a two-horse race
It would still be absurd if Robert Virves didn’t win WRC2 this year with four wins and now a second-place on the board. But the Škoda driver’s runner-up finish in Chile opens the door slightly to the only driver now capable of stopping him.
Teemu Suninen.
Standing by his car ahead of his first shakedown run at the recent Rali Ceredigion, Suninen admitted conversations were happening about resuming his WRC2 campaign given Virves failed to score in Paraguay.
Then we saw his name on the Sardinia entry list.
The odds still comprehensively favor Virves, but Suninen will compete head-to-head with his rival in Sardinia and therefore has the chance to inflict some damage.
What a drive by Yohan Rossel, though! The Frenchman was tactically astute on Friday, preferring not to lead overnight – aware of the challenge running as first Rally2 car behind the Rally1s provides.
Friday night leader, and Lancia team-mate, Nikolay Gryazin crashed anyway, but Rossel dominated to win by almost a minute and claim his third win of the season, and the Ypsilon Rally2 HF Integrale’s first on gravel after successes in Croatia, Canarias and Japan.
Türkkan becomes Turkey’s first WRC champion
The double points Junior WRC finale usually throws up a surprise or two, but it would be unfair to label Ali Türkkan’s coronation as such.
The Turk trailed Calle Carlberg by just three points heading into the final round, with more victories (two) than anybody else.
Carlberg did him a favor with his heavy crash on Saturday afternoon, but Türkkan deserved this success after three years of competitiveness in both events and the championship standings.
He now has the distinction of becoming Turkey’s first World Rally champion of any category, and of course will collect the WRC2 prize for 2027 – a prize that’s worth perhaps even more than in the past given the change of technical regulations that are on the horizon.
