THREE WRC TEAMS WARM-UP FOR FINLAND IN ESTONIA
Tanak to his home event as hyundai and citroen join toyota
Three of the four World Rally Championship teams will tackle this weekend’s Rally Estonia, but local hero and Toyota star Ott Tanak has warned against reading too much into the result.
Regularly used as a shakedown for Rally Poland and Finland, this week’s Rally Estonia will have less bearing on the season in the absence of the Polish event from the calendar. But in terms of speed, the Tartu-based event is still comparable to the best Jyvaskyla has on offer. When Tanak last competed at home in 2014, he won this rally in an R5 car at an average speed of 78mph – the same average as Esapekka Lappi managed on his way to his maiden Finland win in a Toyota Yaris WRC 12 months ago.
“This rally was really good for Poland,” Tanak told MN. “The roads were quite similar [to Poland], but it’s not quite the same for Finland where the surface is a bit harder and there are more jumps. We don’t have the same profile, but the speed will be the same and, after the break and some quite slow, twisty mountain gravel roads, it’s really nice to get out and go fast again.
“We can use this event to set the car up for Finland, it won’t be that different. But the big thing really is for the driver to get the speed again.”
Tanak completed his pre-event test for Finland near Jyvaskyla last month, but he and the Puuppola-based Toyota Gazoo Racing squad will take the test version of the Yaris WRC back to Finland for more pre-event running next week.
“After Estonia I have one more day for testing,” said Tanak. “That’s just to finalise things.”
After dominating Rally Argentina, Tanak then retired early in the following two rounds, departing Portugal with suspension damage while Sardinia was spoiled by radiator damage after a heavy landing. Those two results extended the gap between Tanak and the championship leader Thierry Neuville from 28 to 72 points.
“We can’t say we are out of the championship when we still have a chance to win,” he said. “But it’s very difficult. There’s really nothing for us to plan anymore, just rally-by-rally and try to win as much as possible.”
Victory at home for Tanak this weekend would come as a timely boost ahead of Rally Finland – an event last won by an Estonian in 2003, when Markko Martin interrupted Marcus Gronholm’s run of three straight wins from 2000-’02.
Tanak will lead his world championship colleagues Craig Breen (Citroen C3 WRC) and Hayden Paddon (Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC) away from the start in Tartu on Saturday morning. Having the Irishman and Kiwi competing will provide a solid benchmark.
“It’s good for the rally to have the other cars there,” said Tanak. “And it’s good to be in competition, you can work on the car and change the set-up between the stages, it makes some sense to be able to compare the competition, but I’m not sure how much [should be read into it].
“I’m looking forward to it, it’ll be a nice weekend. The weather has been good and there will be a lot of fans out in the stages. For the Estonians who can’t make it to a WRC round, it’s like the WRC is coming to them, which is good. And, of course, it’s always good to compete at home.”