Elfyn Evans faces a stern challenge as first on the road in Sardinia - and Sébastien Ogier feels for him
Photography by Toyota
Words by Luke Barry
While every single one of Elfyn Evans’ rivals would ordinarily love to swap positions with him and benefit from a 30-point championship lead – they wouldn’t this weekend.
Starting first on the road is nearly always a handicap on loose-surface events unless it rains, but the effect is particularly pronounced on Sardinia’s slow and rocky stages.
Evans’ situation this week is therefore one few will envy – but at least he only has six stages to sweep rather than the 10 he did in Portugal.
“The more typical schedule should hopefully help in that respect,” Evans noted.
But he’s not pretending there’s not a huge challenge ahead, particularly considering his off-beat Portuguese performance.
“We’re still looking for some more performance on this type of rally, and with the limited testing available it’s not easy to find an immediate solution,” he added.
“But we’re going to give it our best like always and try to come away with as many points as we can.”
Evans' situation is one team-mate Ogier can understand
Evans’ team-mate Sébastien Ogier knows this situation well. Over the years he became the master of salvaging the most out of these tricky weekends – not least in 2021 when in an epic drive, he managed to win the rally from first on the road.
So what is Ogier’s advice for Evans?
“I wish I could give him proper advice!” Ogier told DirtFish. “But fight hard and try to do the best every single weekend.
“I’ve been often also in situations where you come to rallies and you know your chance of wins are very, very small, and it’s frustrating but that’s unfortunately… I would say still unfortunately because everybody knows what I think about the starting of the rules, I don’t need to mention it again!
“But yeah, that’s the way it goes for him. And I remember some weeks ago now people were just like already thinking, or celebrating, that you have a massive lead, can now control the championship.
“And I was inside my head saying ‘Yeah… for now!’
“But let’s wait that the gravel rallies are starting and it’s going to be a tough time for him, but it’s still better to have this 30-point lead. It’s still a good lead ahead of the others.
“We have new tires, issues can happen. Rough rallies like Sardinia and Greece, things can happen too. And then, I don’t know, it’s not automatically that your gap is going to reduce.
“Again, the only advice is fight hard and take every point you can.”
But the same rings true for his rivals – namely team-mate Kalle Rovanperä and Hyundai’s pair of world champions Thierry Neuville and Ott Tänak.
With things expected to level out in terms of road position for Estonia and Finland, the game for Evans is to not lose too much ground in Sardinia or Greece, while the others need to push as much as they can to erode the Welshman’s advantage.
“I want to be fighting for the win,” Neuville stressed, “so I need to finish ahead of my main championship rivals.”
Words:Luke Barry
Tags: Elfyn Evans, Rally Italy Sardinia, Rally Italy Sardinia 2025, Sébastien Ogier, WRC, WRC 2025
Publish Date June 2, 2025 DirtFish
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