How Rovanpera fired the WRC a timely reminder of his class in Portugal

By:

Tom Howard

May 15, 2023, 3:20 PM

Winless in the opening four rounds of his World Rally Championship title defence, Kalle Rovanpera silenced criticism with a stirring drive to open his account for 2023 on Rally Portugal. The Toyota driver's 54s margin over the chasing Hyundais as he secured a ninth WRC victory served as a statement of intent as he returned to the championship lead in fine style

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Without a win since becoming the youngest World Rally champion last October, and having registered only one podium in four events this season, Kalle Rovanpera’s quiet start to his World Rally Championship title defence had started to raise questions. But in Portugal last weekend, the Finn delivered an emphatic answer to prove once again that form is temporary and class is permanent.

Rovanpera already knew that defending his crown was going to be more difficult than winning the first, but few would have predicted his start to 2023 after raising the bar to heights never seen before from a 22-year-old in the WRC. Twelve months ago, Rovanpera didn’t seem human during his relentless record-breaking run to the title. These mesmerising performances were so frequent they had become the norm and expected every time he jumped behind the wheel, leaving many surprised by his absence from the podium in the previous three events prior to Portugal.

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Tom Howard

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Tom Howard is a News Editor working across both Autosport.com and Motorsport.com websites. Starting out as a sports reporter in local newspapers, Tom focussed on motorsport covering several national championships in the UK, including the BTCC.

After a period working as a freelance journalist, Tom moved to Australia in 2013 landing a job at leading Australian motorsport news outlet speedcafe.com, covering international motorsport events including F1, WRC and Supercars. Progressing to Editor in 2017, Tom was named Motorsport Australia Journalist of the Year for his work. He is also a two-time winner of Supercars Journalist of The Year (2017,2019) and a Supercars Championship Media Award winner in 2019.

Tom moved back to his native UK in 2020, firstly working in BTCC, before joining Autosport and motorsport.com in 2021.