During the forced break in the work of our site, which lasted more than a month, a lot of important and really interesting events have already happened in the World Rally Championship – during this time two rounds of the WRC took place in New Zealand (September 29 – October 2) and Spain (October 20-23). It was the New Zealand rally that finally gave the final answer to the question that most rally fans have been wondering about lately – will the Finn Kalle Rovanperä be able to regain self-confidence and become the youngest rally world champion in history after an unexpected loss of pace and two disappointing failures in a row (in Belgium and Greece)? And Rovanperä proved to be really unsurpassed on the New Zealand tracks – he won the Repco Rally New Zealand, showed the best time on the Power Stage, got the maximum possible 30 points (25 + 5) and finally became unattainable for all his rivals! Two more interesting details can be noted. Firstly, it was his 50th start on the WRC stages for the Finn. And he celebrated this round event by winning the rally and the championship title! Second – on October 1, Rovanperä celebrated his birthday, on October 2 he won the New Zealand rally and the WRC title! Thus, Kalle at the age of only 22 years and 1 day became the youngest world rally champion and broke the old record of Colin McRae, who in 1995 won the title at the age of 27 years 89 days, by five years.
Some facts
In fact, after the New Zealand absolute triumph of Rowanperry in the final two stages of the WRC-2022 (in Catalonia and Japan), only two questions remained open in the major league – will Toyota retain its leadership in the team standings and who exactly will become the second or third winners of the championship in the absolute standings? The Spanish round put an end to the team confrontation – the Toyotas won the second victory in a row and finally buried all the hopes of rivals from Hyundai Motorsport to somehow “reach” the fight to the final in Japan… It should be noted that in this rapid October counteroffensive of Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT, a decisive role was played by Sébastien Ogier, who decided to take part in the final three stages – the multiple world champion finally replaced Esapekka Lappi, won the second position in New Zealand and the victory in Catalonia, thanks to which for two stages brought to the team’s treasury 51 points! In fact, the Frenchman saved the Japanese-Finnish team, which in August-September began to rapidly “collapse” due to the failures of Kalle Rovanperi (Belgium, Greece) and Elfin Evans (during the performances in Greece, New Zealand, Catalonia, the Welshman managed to score only 8 points). What did this spectacular Toyota counteroffensive on the New Zealand and Catalan tracks performed by Rowanperry and Ogier look like in numbers?
Sébastien Augier played a crucial role