Ott Tänak is the early leader of Rally Finland, impressively winning Thursday evening’s opening street stage by over a second.
As has been the norm for years, the Harju stage around the streets of Jyväskylä kicked off one of the most anticipated events of the year.
Tänak starts 2025’s edition of Rally Finland as the world championship leader, and flexed his authority over the field to beat his team-mate Thierry Neuville by a strong 1.3s.
“Robert [Virves] drove the stage before, he gave me some good tips: big balls and all-in or flat out,” Tänak smiled.
Behind Tänak, the next six cars were split by less than a second. Neuville was second quickest ahead of Sébastien Ogier, Kalle Rovanperä, Adrien Fourmaux and Elfyn Evans who shared the same time as Takamoto Katsuta.
Grégoire Munster got the better of Toyota’s Sami Pajari as well as his M-Sport team-mates; Josh McErlean 0.5s slower than Munster but. in turn, 0.5s quicker than Mãrtiņš Sesks.
Robert Virves has taken an early lead of WRC2, 0.7s ahead of Yohan Rossel who is scoring points for his team (PH Sport) but not himself.
Jari-Matti Latvala is third in his Toyota, with Oliver Solberg fifth overnight.