The TOYOTA GAZOO Racing World Rally Team faces a fresh challenge on Rally de España (October 5-8): the only round of the FIA World Rally Championship run on both gravel and asphalt. This mixed-surface event will provide a thorough test of the development of the Yaris WRC during its first season. Already, the car has won on snow in Sweden in the hands of Jari-Matti Latvala and on gravel in Finland with Esapekka Lappi. Progress has been made on asphalt too as seen last time out in Germany, where Juho Hänninen finished fourth and all three drivers took stage wins.
Historically, the Spanish round of the WRC has been run over the smooth, fast and flowing asphalt roads of Catalunya, which are similar to racing circuits in their characteristics. Since 2010, these stages have been preceded by a day on gravel. Teams are required to transfer the cars from gravel to asphalt specification within a 75-minute service on Friday evening.
The rally begins on Thursday evening with a ceremonial start in the service park in Salou ahead of three stages all run twice on Friday run mostly on gravel – although the 38.95-kilometre Terra Alta test features sections of asphalt. Saturday features two loops of three stages followed by a Salou seafront test and there are six more stages on Sunday.
Following the launch of EchoCam on Rally Finland, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing and its partner Microsoft will offer HoloLens mixed reality technology on Rally de España as a trial. It will be available at the TGR fan booth at the service park from Thursday to Saturday.
Jari-Matti Latvala (Driver car 10)
“I like the combination in Spain of having the first day on gravel and then two days on asphalt. They are the best asphalt roads in the championship – as close to a race circuit as is possible – and the gravel stages are also quite good. I did two days of testing for Spain this week: on the asphalt, we were focused on the suspension, and on gravel we concentrated on the differential. The change of surface creates extra work for the mechanics and the engineers, and as drivers we need to adapt our driving style overnight,. Our car showed winning speed on gravel in Finland and the performance was also there on asphalt in Germany, so I believe we should be very competitive.”
2017 FIA World Rally Championship for drivers after round 10:
1 Sebastien Ogier 177
2 Thierry Neuville 160
3 Ott Tanak 144
4 Jari-Matti Latvala 123
5 Dani Sordo 89
6 Elfyn Evans 87
7 Craig Breen 64
8 Juho Hänninen 58
9 Hayden Paddon 55
10 Esapekka Lappi 49
2017 FIA World Rally Championship for manufacturers after round 10:
1 M-Sport World Rally Team 325
2 Hyundai Motorsport 261
3 TOYOTA GAZOO Racing WRT 213
4 Citroen Total Abu Dhabi World Rally Team 163
Press release TOYOTA GAZOO Racing World Rally Team
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