2020 World Rally Championship


The 2020 FIA World Rally Championship is the forty-eighth season of the World Rally Championship, an auto racing competition recognised by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile as the highest class of international rallying. Teams and crews are competing in eight rallies for the World Rally Championships for Drivers, Co-drivers and Manufacturers. Crews are free to compete in cars complying with World Rally Car and Group R regulations; however, only manufacturers competing with World Rally Cars homologated under regulations introduced in 2017 are eligible to score points in the Manufacturers' championship. The championship began in January 2020 with the Rallye Monte Carlo and is due to conclude in November 2020 with Rally Japan. The series is supported by the World Rally Championship-2, World Rally Championship-3 and Junior World Rally Championship categories at selected events.
Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja are the defending Drivers' and Co-drivers' Champions, having secured their maiden titles at the 2019 Rally Catalunya. Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT, the team Tänak and Järveoja compete for, are the defending Manufacturers' Champions. Hyundai won their maiden manufacturers' title when the final round of the 2019 championship was cancelled.
After the third round, six-time world champions Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia lead drivers' and co-drivers' championships by eight points ahead of Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin. Thierry Neuville and Nicolas Gilsoul are third, a further twelve points behind. In the manufacturers' championship, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT holds a twenty-one-point lead over the reigning manufacturer champion Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT, with M-Sport Ford WRT in third. The championship is largely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw the calendar rescheduled.

Calendar

The 2020 championship was due to be contested over thirteen rounds in Europe, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, North and South America and Oceania, but the calendar had been rescheduled to only eight rounds due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The following rounds were included on the original calendar published by WRC Promoter GmbH, but were cancelled due to different reasons:

Calendar changes

With the addition of Rally Chile to the calendar in 2019, the FIA opened the tender process for new events to join the championship in 2020. Bids to revive Rally Japan and the Safari Rally were received, and candidate events were run in 2019. Both events were accepted to the 2020 calendar, as was a proposal to revive Rally New Zealand.
The addition of these events saw the Tour de Corse and the Rallies of Catalunya and Australia removed from the calendar. Organisers of Rally Catalunya agreed to forfeit their place on the 2020 calendar as part of a rotation system that will see European events host rallies in two out of three calendar years. The Tour de Corse was removed in response to concerns from teams about the logistics of visiting Corsica, while Rally Australia was removed as the event's base in a regional centre rather than a major metropolitan area meant that the rally struggled to attract spectators. Rally Chile was included on the original calendar, but was later removed in the face of ongoing political unrest in the country. The FIA sought a replacement event to ensure that the calendar retained its planned fourteen rounds, but were unable to do so.
The Rallies in Italy were postponed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Events in Argentina, Portugal, Kenya, Finland, New Zealand and Great Britain were cancelled. Organisers of the championship announced that they were considering adding events to the schedule that had not been part of the original calendar. Estonia, Belgium, Latvia, Croatia and Czech Republic were among the countries who had expressed interest in hosting the event.
would be the thirty-third country to host a World Rally Championship rally.
On 2 July 2020, it was announced that the season would return with an updated calendar. The season is expected to resume with newcomers Rally Estonia hosting the resuming round between 4 to 6 September. The country would become the thirty-third nation to stage a championship round in the WRC. Further calendar options may include Ypres Rally and Croatia Rally. The running date of Rally Turkey was moved forward by a week, which facilitates the opportunity for additional rounds.

Route changes

Prior to the Rally Sweden, it was confirmed that the route for the rally had to be shortened due to a lack of snow. The route of Rally Mexico was shortened to allow teams time to pack up and return to their headquarters before several European nations imposed travel bans in a bid to manage the pandemic.

Entries

The following teams and crews are under contract to contest the 2020 championship. Ford, Hyundai and Toyota are all represented by manufacturer teams and eligible to score points in the FIA World Rally Championship for Manufacturers. All competitors use tyres supplied by Michelin.

Summary

Reigning World Champions Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja left Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT and moved to Hyundai Motorsport. The Estonian pair chose not to compete with the number 1, which may only be used by the defending champions. Thierry Neuville and Nicolas Gilsoul remained with Hyundai, marking their seventh season with the team. Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena also renewed their contracts with the team. Loeb and Elena will contest the championship on a part-time basis, sharing their car with the crew of Dani Sordo and Carlos del Barrio. Crews led by Andreas Mikkelsen and Craig Breen were left without drives. Hyundai announced that they could form a second team for Breen and Mikkelsen to contest selected rallies, and later entered Breen in Rally Sweden.
The Citroën World Rally Team had committed to entering two full-time entries instead of three, continuing the policy they introduced in 2019. Sébastien Ogier and Esapekka Lappi were under contract to lead the team's crews until the team announced that they would withdraw from the championship with immediate effect. Citroën cited Ogier's decision to leave the team as the reason for withdrawing, but pledged support for independent teams competing with the R5 variant of the Citroën C3 WRC in the championship's support categories. The company also expressed a willingness to sell or rent their C3 WRCs to teams looking to compete in the sport's premier category.
Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT will feature an entirely new line-up in 2020. Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia will replace Ott Tänak and Martin Jarveojä, while Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin were recruited from M-Sport Ford WRT. Reigning World Rally Championship-2 Pro champions Kalle Rovanperä and Jonne Halttunen will make their competitive début in Toyota's third car. Toyota will enter an additional two cars for Jari-Matti Latvala and Takamoto Katsuta on a part-time basis. Katsuta will contest all of the European rallies under the Toyota Gazoo Racing name while Latvala will contest two events—with further starts depending on his budget—as an independent entrant. Former Toyota Gazoo Racing driver Juho Hänninen will be Latvala's co-driver, replacing Miikka Anttila. Anttila moved to the World Rally Championship-3, partnering Eerik Pietarinen. Kris Meeke remained under contract with the team, but stepped back from full-time competition.
M-Sport Ford WRT continued their policy of entering two crews on a full-time basis and a third crew contesting selected rounds. Teemu Suninen and Jarmo Lehtinen were retained, while Esapekka Lappi and Janne Ferm replaced Evans and Martin in the team's second car. Gus Greensmith and Elliott Edmondson, who contested three rounds of the 2019 championship with the team, will contest an expanded programme of nine rounds in 2020.
Reigning World Rally Championship-2 champions Pierre-Louis Loubet and Vincent Landais are expected to make their début in a World Rally Car during the year. Loubet will combine his World Rally Championship programme with a factory-supported drive in the World Rally Championship-2.

Regulation changes

Sporting regulations

The eligibility requirements for crews entering events will be simplified and streamlined into a system called the "FIA Rally Pyramid". The top tier of the sport, known as "Rally 1" will be for World Rally Cars built to regulations introduced in 2017. The second tier, "Rally 2", will be for manufacturer teams and professional independent teams entering R5 cars in the World Rally Championship-2. This will be followed by "Rally 3" for privately-entered and "gentlemen driver" crews competing with R5 cars in the World Rally Championship-3. "Rally 4" entries will not contest their own dedicated championship, but will instead serve as a bridging category aimed at making the step from R2 to R5 more manageable by allowing R2 entries to be equipped with four-wheel drive. The final tier, "Rally 5", will be for crews entering R2 cars in the Junior World Rally Championship.
The FIA implemented a temporary testing ban in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The ban was imposed because the three manufacturer teams were based in different countries—Hyundai in Germany, M-Sport in Britain and Toyota in Finland—each with their own restrictions. This created the potential for one team to gain a competitive advantage because of their home nation's restrictions.
The road order would be revised in response to the shortened route at the calendar newcomers, Rally Estonia. Saturday's morning loop would start as championship order, while the afternoon loop would revert to the standard reversed order, which usually comes into effect on the second leg.

Season report

Opening rounds

The 2020 FIA World Rally Championship started in Monaco. The sport saw a series of crew changes in the off-season, which included reigning world champions Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja moving to Hyundai. Tänak and Järveoja's title defence started poorly when they suffered a high-speed crash on the fourth stage of the rally, which saw their Hyundai i20 flying off a high cliff at, rolling end-over-end through a series of trees and landing on the road below; both Tänak and Järveoja walked away uninjured. Following the crash, Hyundai's hopes rode on the shoulders of Thierry Neuville and Nicolas Gilsoul. Despite holding the lead on Thursday night, Friday saw the Toyota crews of Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia their and teammates Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin take the lead. The lead would swing backwards and forwards throughout the rally until Neuville and Gilsoul won seven out of the eight final stage—including winning the Power Stage—to record their first win in Monte Carlo.
As championship leaders, Neuville and Gilsoul became the first crew on the road in Sweden. This saw them struggle throughout the weekend as their position meant they swept loose gravel away from the faster road base underneath, which was further complicated by the rally being shortened due to a lack of snow. They rally was eventually won by Evans and Martin. The Toyota crew dominated the rally, winning five stages out of nine, to take victory—the second for Evans, the first for Martin—and the lead both drivers' and co-drivers' standings for the first time in their careers. Their team-mate Kalle Rovanperä recorded his first stage win at the sport's highest level when he and co-driver Jonne Halttunen won the Power Stage. Rovanperä and Halttunen also achieved their maiden podium finish. At the age of nineteen, Rovanperä became the youngest driver ever to claim a WRC podium finish.
As the championship contined on to Latin America, the world began to feel the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to the postponements of the Rally Sardegna, and the cancellations of the Rally Argentina, Rally Portugal, Safari Rally Kenya, Rally Finland, Rally New Zealand and Wales Rally GB. Although the Rally Mexico began as planned, the final leg of the rally was cancelled to allow teams enough time to return to their home bases before travel restrictions came into effect. This meant the rally was shortened to two legs. Tänak and Järveoja were leading the first leg until suspension damage saw them drop over forty seconds. Neuville and Gilsoul were running third overall, but they had to retire from the day with electrical problem. Hyundai's third entry of Dani Sordo and Carlos del Barrio suffered a radiator pipe issue on the morning loop which lost them five minutes, and they ultimately retired with a terminal engine fault. Esapekka Lappi and Janne Ferm also retired when their Fiesta caught fire. Ogier and Ingrassia enjoyed a trouble-free weekend and won their first rally of the season. With a consistent performance in the early season, the six-time world champions took an early lead in the championships. The result also saw Toyota expand their lead in the manufacturers' championship, twenty-one points ahead of defending manufacturer champions Hyundai.

Results and standings

Season summary

Scoring system

Points were awarded to the top ten classified finishers in each event. In the manufacturers' championship, teams were eligible to nominate three crews to score points, but these points were only awarded to the top two classified finishers representing a manufacturer and driving a 2017-specification World Rally Car. There were also five bonus points awarded to the winners of the Power Stage, four points for second place, three for third, two for fourth and one for fifth. Power Stage points were only awarded in the drivers' and co-drivers' championships.
Position1st2nd3rd4th5th6th7th8th9th10th
Points251815121086421

FIA World Rally Championship for Drivers

FIA World Rally Championship for Co-Drivers

FIA World Rally Championship for Manufacturers

Only the best two results of each manufacturer at each rally are taken into account for the World Manufacturers’ Championship.