Sebastien Ogier extends record with another win

Sebastien Ogier came through a marathon Rally Portugal to claim a record extending seventh World Rally Championship victory at the gravel rally.

Ogier and co-driver Vincent Landais navigated a particularly demanding schedule that tested crews and teams to the limit to win the 24-stage contest as Toyota continued its 100% winning start to 2025.

The eight-time world champion took a 63rd career win by 8.7s from long time leader Ott Tanak, who managed to recover to second after a power steering failure. Two-time world champion Kalle Rovanpera completed the podium [+12.2s] after losing out to a charging Tanak.

“It was a tough fight with Ott, unfortunately not fair to the end with his problem. Otherwise we would have not won, because he was obviously quicker, but it’s not always about being quick in rallying, you also have to bring it home and that’s what we did,” said Ogier, who moves to third in the championship standings.

Ogier initially made a slow start to the rally, struggling with the set-up on his GR Yaris. The Frenchman made some adjustments, however, and quickly rose up the leaderboard through an energy sapping 10-stage Friday leg that covered 683 kilometres, (146 competitive), which sparked criticism from drivers.

However, the pace was set by Hyundai as the Korean marque bounced back from its Rally Islas Canarias struggles to enjoy a 1-2 through most of Friday. Tanak and team-mate Adrien Fourmaux were locked in battle for the lead as the pair shared the fastest times through the first four stages on Friday. Tanak held a 0.2s margin over Fourmaux at the first remote service before eking out a further six tenths across the next two stages.

By stage eight, Fourmaux’s challenge came to an abrupt stop when his i20 N suffered a front left suspension failure that forced the Frenchman into retirement. Fourmaux rejoined the rally on Saturday but retired again on Sunday due to an overheating engine.

Tanak continued his strong pace to end a brutal Friday by extending his lead to seven seconds over Ogier, who hauled himself to second following a strong afternoon charge. Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta sat third, 1.2s ahead of Rovanpera, who struggled to unlock speed on Hankook’s gravel tyres throughout the rally.

Ogier continued to mount a charge on Saturday, closing to within two seconds of Tanak, who was hampered by a puncture. An inspired set-up tweak helped Tanak deliver a stunning time on stage 14, 9.8s quicker than Ogier to restore and extend his lead.

At this point Tanak appeared to be in control of the rally as three consecutive stage wins pushed the advantage out to 13.9s. But the Estonian’s hopes of a first win of the season were dashed by a sudden power steering failure, caused by a broken steering rack midway through stage 17. Tanak was forced to wrestle the car to service and dropped to third, 36.1s behind new leader Ogier.

Thierry Neuville, Martijn Wydaeghe, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

Ogier held a 27.1s gap over second-placed Rovanpera entering Sunday’s final six stages but opted not to take any risks in the first of them. Rovanpera took 11.1s out of Ogier on stage 19 to apply pressure on the leader but the charge was short-lived.

Tanak produced a stirring fightback on Sunday setting his sights on Rovanpera, whose pace wilted as the day progressed. In the end, Tanak managed to overhaul the Finn to claim second, topping the Super Sunday standings to bag an extra 10 points.

Reigning world champion team-mate Thierry Neuville came home in fourth [+38.5s] after a difficult rally spent fighting the balance of his i20 N.

After running as high as second, Katsuta was unable to maintain the pace, dropping to fifth at the finish. The Japanese did however salvage two points from the Fafe Power Stage.

Elfyn Evans witnessed his championship lead over Rovanpera reduced from 43 to 21 points after a difficult rally that was initially hampered by opening the road.

The Welshman was unable to extract the best from his GR Yaris, but did snatch sixth [+2m31.0s] on the final day from team-mate Sami Pajari.

Rally1 rookie Josh McErlean produced arguably his most impressive showing to date to beat his more experienced M-Sport-Ford team-mate to finish eighth [+5m12.3s]. Martins Sesks’ second start of a partial campaign proved eventful after suffering a puncture in stage 2 that cost the Latvian three minutes. A further three-minute penalty followed after starting stage seven late.

Oliver Solberg completed a resounding WRC2 win over Yohan Rossel to round out the top 10.