Why co-driver Landais has reason to smile

This time last year, Landais’ prospects were looking great. He was co-driving Pierre-Louis Loubet and the pair has just guided a Ford Puma Rally1 Hybrid to fourth overall in Sardinia. Fast forward a few months and his career was fast-tracked into the right-hand seat alongside eight-time world champion Ogier.

Since they started in FORUM8 Rally Japan last year, they’ve compted on six rounds of the World Rally Championship. And won three of them.

For Landais, last week’s Safari Rally Kenya success was the icing on the cake.

“It has been a wonderful season so far,” he said. “It has been quite an amazing year for me. I have been on the podium three times in my life and it has been three victories, so I cannot complain for the moment I have to say. It is so, so nice and in my mind Monte Carlo, Mexico and here are the most important rallies.

Talking more specifically about the challenge of Africa, he added: “It was quite a big challenge for me also because the roads are quite different from anywhere else. I couldn’t see the road sometimes because my head was shaking a lot in the seat, so I couldn’t read some pacenotes – so I had to take some time before to properly check and be sure the pacenotes were like this because my book is moving too much and I couldn’t see. It was a proper challenge.

“But to be with a guy like Séb is really something incredible – it’s fantastic to be with this whole Toyota team!”