How Sardinia served up a WRC sprint surprise for Tanak

Toyota's World Rally Championship part-timer Sebastien Ogier looked set for a fifth win in Italy, before problems on the final stage handed victory to Hyundai’s Ott Tanak. The top two proved the class of the field in a thrilling Rally Sardinia as a new event format made its debut

When the World Rally Championship chose Sardinia to trial its new 48-hour format, few would have predicted the concoction of drama, joy and heartbreak that conspired to produce the joint closest victory in series history.

Two tenths of a second is barely a blink of an eye. But that was the margin that handed Hyundai’s Ott Tanak and Martin Jarveoja victory as a puncture three kilometres from completing the prescribed 266.12km (165 miles), denied Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier a record fifth Sardinia win.

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Author Tom Howard

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.