WRC Rally Sweden: Evans takes overnight lead pipping Rovanpera
13th February 2025Toyota’s Elfyn Evans has taken the overnight lead of the World Rally Championship’s Rally Sweden, pipping teammate Kalle Rovanpera.
Feature image credit: Jaanus Ree / Red Bull Content Pool
Evans was the first driver to be out on the road as he took up his position as the net-championship leader after, teammate, Sebastien Ogier missed the event as part of his part-time schedule.
Despite this, Evans seemed to have the best conditions on the road as the Welshman topped the timing boards on the opening stage, the Umea Sprint – a shorter version of the Umea stage.
Kalle Rovanpera finished the first stage just behind his teammate, Evans, as the Finnish driver sat 0.5 seconds behind. The two-time world champion put in an identical time as Hyundai’s 2019 world champion, Ott Tanak who finished third.
Tanak’s teammate, and podium sitter in Monte Carlo, Adrien Fourmaux found himself sandwiched in between his teammates in fourth as he pipped Theirry Neuville who was fifth.
One down, 17 to go 💪 pic.twitter.com/fe7WOXeKLq
— FIA World Rally Championship (@OfficialWRC) February 13, 2025
The defending world champion, Neuville, fell off in the opening stage and found himself 3.7 seconds behind. The Belgian world champion claimed he was having trouble with his intercom and took a more cautious approach.
Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta and Sami Pajari completed the Toyota line-up down in sixth and seventh with the latter 5.6s off Evans’ time.
This left Joshua McErlean, Gregoire Munster and Martins Sesks of M-Sport Ford to round out the top 10 in eighth, ninth and 10th respectively. Jourdan Serderidis found himself down in 26th to complete the Ford line-up.
It’s an early start on Friday for the competitors as the weekend gets underway in true fashion, with seven stages to be faced across snowy terrain.
Read more WRC here:
- WRC Rally Sweden 2025: Preview
- Elfyn Evans to ‘try and adapt’ to Hankook tyres in Rally Sweden
- Hyundai set to bring a ‘redeveloped’ car to WRC Rally Sweden
- Toyota expecting ‘tricky’ start but hoping for Rally Sweden win
- Rovanpera deems Arctic Rally ‘good and valuable’ test for WRC Rally Sweden
- Verstappen to compete in ERC season for 2025
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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.
