Thierry Neuville is convinced Hyundai’s upgraded 2025 World Rally Championship challenger has more potential than its predecessor despite struggles unlocking its speed this season.
The reigning world champion admitted he was worried by the gap in performance between Hyundai and Toyota after Rally Chile, where Neuville revealed that the team had tried several set-ups, but was ultimately unable to unlock optimum pace from the 2025-specification i20 N.
It is not the first time Hyundai has struggled with its heavily upgraded car. In April the team was unable to fight with Toyota in the Canary Islands when the car tackled asphalt for the first time after the 2024-spec car was used for the season-opening asphalt round in Monte Carlo.
Team-mate Adrien Fourmaux suggested after Chile that Hyundai should conduct a back-to-back test between its 2024 and 2025 cars to see which is faster ahead of next week’s return to asphalt at the Central European Rally.
Since Chile, Hyundai has been busy as it bids to further understand its 2025 car and prepare for CER. Neuville contested the East Belgian Rally before a pre-event test day, while Fourmaux tackled last weekend’s European Rally Championship round in Croatia and is set to run at weekend’s Herbst Rallye in Austria. Ott Tanak has also been back behind the wheel testing.
Neuville says his outing in Belgium has delivered some “interesting conclusions” from the extra mileage completed, and is convinced that the 2025 car will deliver results.
“For me, the 2025 car has much more potential than the 2024 car, and I think we just didn’t [get] the best out of the car,” said Neuville.
Thierry Neuville, Hyundai World Rally Team
Photo by: Romain Thuillier / Hyundai Motorsport
“We know we have some room for improvement and we have detected some areas for improvement, and hopefully those areas can be quickly solved.
“To be in the right in the window is a bit of a change compared to the 2024 car, but maybe we haven’t found the right perfect window yet, at least for the last asphalt event.
“Hopefully now we are working better. There is room for improvement in terms of set-ups and the windows for where the car is working.
“We still need a bit more driving, but I think we have made some progress and we know where we can make some progress.”
Looking ahead to next week’s Central European Rally, an event Neuville won in 2023, the 21-time WRC rally winner says it is hard to predict how the team will fare against Toyota.
“I think we don’t know how we will compare [to the Toyotas] so we will have to find out,” he added.
“We will only see after a couple of stages; the event will be weather-related, and obviously our road position is not great, so it is not a big help if it is raining.”
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– The Autosport.com Team
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