Rally

The 2019 World Rally Championship finale Rally Australia has been cancelled amid concerns about the rapidly spreading fires closing in on the event’s Coffs Harbour base. Official confirmation of the decision from rally organisers is expected imminently. Autosport has seen email confirmation from rally officials to the FIA and WRC Promoter declaring the cancellation, with

World Rally champion Ott Tanak’s sensational move from Toyota to Hyundai – sealed just before his title – is only the start of the 2020 driver market machinations. In a special rallying edition of the Autosport Podcast, David Evans joins Edd Straw to consider what happens next in the WRC. Will Sebastien Ogier walk out

Rally Australia organisers have revealed a heavily revised schedule as a proposal to keep this week’s World Rally Championship finale running. The route for the Coffs Harbour-based event has been hit by bushfires raging up and down the east coast of New South Wales. A bulletin issued by clerk of the course Wayne Kenny outlines

World Rally Championship finale Rally Australia will have a “significantly shortened” route – if it goes ahead at all – due to a worsening fire situation in the area. Bush fires have been burning for days in New South Wales and worsening weather conditions – including strengthening winds set to run into Tuesday – are

Chris Ingram has become the first British driver to win the European Rally Championship title since Vic Elford in 1967 after finishing fourth on the season-closing Rally Hungary. Ingram, driving a Toksport WRT-prepared Skoda Fabia R5 with Ross Whittock as co-driver, overcame two punctures and a spin on the final day to edge home on

Double Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso achieved his first podium finish in cross-country rallying in the third of his Dakar Rally preparatory outings with Toyota. Alonso and co-driver Marc Coma contested this week’s Al Ula-Neom Cross-Country Rally in Saudi Arabia, where the Dakar is being held for the first time in 2020. They were

Rally Australia officials are becoming increasingly concerned by the onset of bush fires in New South Wales ahead of next week’s 2019 World Rally Championship finale. Because of the fires, the roads being used for the WRC event are currently closed to all traffic – including event officials hoping to set stages up for the

Ott Tanak is heading to Australia for the season finale as World Rally champion but about to leave the Toyota team for Hyundai for 2020. That’s already a tricky enough psychological situation even without the added factor that Hyundai and Toyota are still battling for the manufacturers’ championship. While no one’s expecting Tanak to be

Elfyn Evans has been tipped as Ott Tanak’s Toyota World Rally Championhip replacement after the Welshman visited the Finnish squad last week. Autosport revelaed before Rally Spain two weeks ago that Tanak would make a shock switch to Hyundai, leavuing the Toyota Gazoo Racing team with which he sealed the 2019 drivers’ championship for the

Hyundai will take Craig Breen to Rally Australia in place of Andreas Mikkelsen for the final round of the 2019 World Rally Championship. The Australian round is key for Hyundai as it chases a maiden WRC manufacturers’ title, and the German-based team will arrive 18 points clear of Toyota. Mikkelsen, who won the Coffs Harbour-based

Mads Ostberg says Citroen has called off his planned World Rally Car outing on Rally Australia, as it was dependent on Sebastien Ogier retaining a shot at the 2019 title. Ostberg has been developing Citroen’s second-tier C3 R5 car this season after he was dropped from Citroen’s top WRC line-up in favour of Rally Finland

Hyundai Motorsport has confirmed Ott Tanak will join its team for the 2020 World Rally Championship season. Autosport broke the news the Estonian would leave his current team Toyota at the end of this season last week. The recently crowned World Rally Champion joins Thierry Neuville, Dani Sordo and Sebastien Loeb for the Korean manufacturer’s

The full story of newly crowned World Rally champion Ott Tanak’s rise and rollercoaster career is brought to life with incredible behind-the-scenes access in Ott Tanak: The Movie – which is now available to view globally. The film was originally released in cinemas in Tanak’s native Estonia in April, but can now be watched anywhere

After new champion Ott Tanak’s shock move to Hyundai, the biggest question surrounding the 2020 World Rally Championship season is whether Toyota will move for Sebastien Ogier. Ogier tested the Yaris WRC in 2016 after Volkswagen’s withdrawal from the WRC but signed for M-Sport, where he added two more titles in a Ford Fiesta WRC.

Double British Rally champion Russell Brookes, infamous for driving his ‘Andrews Heat for Hire’ liveried cars, has passed away at the age of 74. Born on August 16, 1945, Brookes began competing in the early ’60s. But it was ’74 when Brookes signed the pioneering deal with Andrews-Sykes that meant the company’s profits grew and

In this episode of Gravel Notes, two-time Formula 1 champion Fernando Alonso explains his preparation for the Dakar Rally and Ott Tanak reviews his journey to World Rally Championship success. It has been said that Tanak went “through fire and water” to clinch a maiden WRC title, and Tanak talks to podcast host David Evans

Citroen team principal Pierre Budar has revealed details of the failure that cost Sebastien Ogier his chance to fight for a seventh World Rally Championship title in Spain last week. Ogier went into the event 28 points behind championship leader Ott Tanak with two rounds remaining and was leading when a hydraulic issue dropped him

Thierry Neuville says he would welcome Ott Tanak as a team-mate at Hyundai in the 2020 World Rally Championship. Autosport revealed last week that Tanak had sensationally agreed to leave Toyota for Hyundai just before clinching his first WRC title. He will line up alongside Neuville as Hyundai’s full-time drivers, with Sebastien Loeb and Dani

Toyota’s Ott Tanak has won the 2019 World Rally Championship with one round to spare as he took second place at Rally Spain, where Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville secured victory. Neuville tried hard to deny Tanak’s coronation with a perfectly controlled performance. He hit the front on Saturday when the action switched from gravel to asphalt

Thierry Neuville is on the brink of his third World Rally Championship victory of the year on Rally of Spain as Hyundai team-mate Dani Sordo resisted Ott Tanak’s advances. But third place for Tanak would be enough for him to claim his first WRC title, provided he either beats or is just one place behind

Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville has resumed the lead of World Rally Championship Rally of Spain from team-mate Sebastien Loeb as Toyota’s Kris Meeke crashed out of a podium place. After Friday’s six gravel stages, the action switched to Tarmac, and Meeke immediately dethroned Dani Sordo of third place on the opening Savalla test with a second-quickest

Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville heads Rally Spain by 21.5-seconds as World Rally Championship champion-elect Ott Tanak surged onto the podium in place of Sebastien Loeb on Saturday afternoon. The running began with Neuville, Loeb and Sordo preserving a Hyundai 1-2-3, with Toyota’s Tanak 9.8s behind Sordo. But Tanak won the first pass of El Montmell that

Dani Sordo leads Thierry Neuville in a Hyundai 1-2 on the first morning of Rally Spain, as defending World Rally champion Sebastien Ogier’s 2019 title hopes took a battering. Ogier made the best possible start by winning the opening Gandesa stage, pulling a slender 0.7-second advantage over Sordo and a further 0.3s over Neuville. But

Sebastien Loeb has launched himself into the lead of the World Rally Championship’s Rally Spain, sealing a Hyundai 1-2-3 ahead of Thierry Neuville and Dani Sordo. Despite “pushing really hard,” Toyota’s Ott Tanak has slipped from third to fifth place, 20 seconds behind Neuville. But as things stand Tanak, who Autosport has confirmed will switch

World Rally Championship leader Ott Tanak has signed for Hyundai and will drive alongside his current title rival Thierry Neuville in the 2020 season. Autosport’s sources have confirmed the deal was completed earlier this month. Tanak, who has been driving for Toyota for the last two years, denied any such agreement was in place and

Two-time Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso has confirmed he will compete in January’s Dakar Rally with Toyota Gazoo Racing. The Spaniard has been seen testing and competing in the team’s Hilux race car this season, but it took a trio of top 10 times on the recent Morocco Rally to finally convince Alonso that

Carlos Sainz Sr says improvements to the front end of Mini’s Dakar Rally challenger have left him confident about his chances of fighting for a third win next year. Sainz joined the X-Raid Mini squad for last year’s Dakar, finishing 13th in a Mini JCW Buggy, and earlier this month was confirmed for another assault

Hyundai plans to introduce two new cars in the next two years as part of an overhaul of its R5 programme. The manufacturer’s i20 R5 has struggled to match M-Sport’s Ford Fiesta, Skoda’s Fabia R5 and Volkswagen’s new-for-2019 Polo R5 that is effectively sold out until the summer of ’20. Hyundai’s motorsport director Andrea Adamo

Citroen will not use the radical World Rally Championship aero upgrades it recently tested on this week’s Rally of Spain. Pictures – supplied by Hugo Blancher – detailing major changes to the aero on Citroen’s C3 WRC appeared last week and suggested the team was trying the most drastic aero alterations seen since the current

Citroen has entered a third C3 WRC to be driven by Mads Ostberg for next month’s season-closing Rally Australia to potentially boost Sebastien Ogier’s World Rally Championship title hopes. After missing out on a Citroen seat to Ogier and Lappi in 2019, Ostberg has stepped back to help the team develop its new R5 car.