Lappi shades Rovanperä in fast-paced Finland shakedown

The Finn, who claimed his first-ever FIA World Rally Championship victory here on home soil in 2017, edged Toyota GAZOO Racing rival Kalle Rovanperä by a single-tenth of second on the high-speed Ruuhimäki shakedown as just 0.8sec blanketed the top five. Takamoto Katsuta was third in his GR Yaris Rally1, 0.1sec behind team-mate Rovanperä

Rovanperä went fastest on the first pass before Lappi, piloting an i20 N Rally1, topped the timesheets on his second run. Virtual chicanes, a new technological development for WRC, were implemented for the first time on the 4.12km stage and will also feature in both runs of Ouninpohja on Saturday.

“It was not so bad, but I also thought on the last rally that the feeling was fine so we cannot really trust that,” Lappi remarked, referencing his off-pace outing at Tet Rally Latvia last month. “I don’t know what the others have said but it felt quite slippery.”

Toyota drivers Sébastien Ogier and Elfyn Evans were both penalised for incorrect virtual chicane procedures on their opening runs but recovered to place fourth and sixth respectively. Ogier is contesting Rally Finland for the first time since 2021 while Evans, who trailed M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux by 0.2sec on shakedown, is a two-time winner.

Ott Tänak was seventh in his Hyundai, four-tenths of a second behind Evans and 0.3sec up on his championship-leading Hyundai team-mate Thierry Neuville. Ninth went the way of GR Yaris Rally1 debutant Sami Pajari while Grégoire Munster completed the top 10 in his Puma Rally1.

The rally officially begins later today with a fan-friendly stage in the centre of Jyväskylä. The first car is due to start at 19:05 (local).