Toyota targeting a trio of WRC 2024 wins at Rally Italia Sardegna
30th May 2024Feature image credit: Red Bull Content Pool
Toyota are looking for their third consecutive win of the 2024 World Rally Championship season at the upcoming Rally Italia Sardegna, following wins in; Kenya, Croatia and Portugal.
After the iconic gravel rally of Portugal, the WRC will head into yet another with the upcoming Italian rally on the island of Sardinia, for round six of the 2024 world championship.
Although a Toyota driver has secured wins in the last three WRC events, with Kalle Rovanpera (Kenya) and Sebastien Ogier (Croatia and Portugal), the defending world champions trail Hyundai in the standings by four points.
Despite this, Toyota is looking for a strong result to fight back and return to the top of the three-team manufacturer’s standings as they trail Hyundai by four points.
“It was great to win again in Portugal and our performance there was good, but it wasn’t the best rally for some of our drivers and after some small mistakes we didn’t get so many points,” said Toyota Team Principal Jari-Matti Latvala.
“Hopefully in Sardinia we can maintain the performance and keep all our cars on the road without issues. We learned and improved the car in Portugal, and the work done during our test in Sardinia should be suited even better for this rally.”
Heading into the European island, the Rally weekend will see a more condensed format.
Friday will host the shakedown event, ahead of the official start, with four stages opening up the weekend in the afternoon. Eight stages lineup Saturday’s action, with two repeated stages in the morning and afternoon, without a mid-day service. Four stages complete Super Sunday with two repeated stages on the final day.
As a result, it means a total of 266.12km of action will be compacted into 48 hours worth of action.
Talking about the condensed action, Latvala said:
“It’s going to be interesting to see the new more compact format in action in Sardinia: it will be a shorter event but not an easier rally, with long days and still quite many kilometres, and I think it could be even more exciting.
“Saturday afternoon is especially long and tough with the notorious Monte Lerno stage, and managing the tyres and avoiding the rocks will be key for success.”
Eight-time world champion Sebastien Ogier will complete the Toyota line-up alongside Elfyn Evans and Takamoto Katsuta.
The French world champion will be looking for his fifth rally win in Sardinia, following his most recent victory on the island in 2021.
At the same time, he will be looking for his third consecutive victory having previously stood on the top step in Croatia and Portugal.
“We have been on a good run recently with our wins in Croatia and Portugal and we would of course like to try and carry on like this – so the target for Sardinia has to be to continue the sequence if we can,” said Ogier.
“I think we are in a good position: we had a good test there recently, and in Portugal when the surface was sandier and more like Sardinia the car was working well, so hopefully that can be the case there as well.
“It’s always a difficult challenge with long stages and the need for tyre management, but it’s a rally that I learned to love and to master over my career and I hope we can have another successful trip there.”
Read more WRC here:
- Ogier secures unprecedented sixth WRC win at Rally de Portugal
- Ogier leads as Rovanpera crashes in WRC Rally de Portugal
- Rovanpera leads Toyota top three in WRC Rally de Portugal
- Neuville takes the opening WRC stage win in 2024 Rally de Portugal
- Neuville tops day 2 of Rally Croatia as the rally heats up
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Hi, I’m Kamron. I created ApexMotorsports.co.uk in the dying embers of the 2021 Formula 1 world championship. It allowed me freedom to write whatever I wanted to write about which was all things motorsports, my passion.
I have put a lot of effort in over the years to keep this website in its best shape and I’ve loved seeing the brand grow consistently, month-on-month, year-on-year. My ambition is to keep watching this brand grow into a primary outlet of news for all things motorsports whilst fueling my desire to pursue a career in sports journalism, specialising in motorsports.
Kamron Kent
Hi, I'm Kamron. I created ApexMotorsports.co.uk in the dying embers of the 2021 Formula 1 world championship. It allowed me freedom to write whatever I wanted to write about which was all things motorsports, my passion. I have put a lot of effort in over the years to keep this website in its best shape and I've loved seeing the brand grow consistently, month-on-month, year-on-year. My ambition is to keep watching this brand grow into a primary outlet of news for all things motorsports whilst fueling my desire to pursue a career in sports journalism, specialising in motorsports.
