Sebastien Ogier to make WRC return at Rally Finland

Sebastien Ogier will add Rally Finland to his part-time 2025 World Rally Championship campaign after opting to sit out Rally Estonia later this month.

Ogier has today confirmed that he will make his sixth start of the WRC season on Finland’s fast gravel roads, which will host the ninth round of the season (31 July–3 August). It means Toyota will again field five Rally1 cars, with Ogier teaming up with full-timers Kalle Rovanpera, Elfyn Evans, Takamoto Katsuta and Sami Pajari.

The eight-time world champion had hinted that Finland could be the next destination for his partial season at last weekend’s Acropolis Rally Greece, where he finished second behind Hyundai’s Ott Tanak. Ogier will return to Finland after winning last year’s edition, which marked his second career triumph at the event.

“My summer will actually not be as free as initially planned. I had already been thinking for a while that doing Rally Finland again would be something nice, as obviously last year was a great rally for me with my second win up there,” said Ogier via a video message on social media.

“I mentioned a while ago to the team, that, yeah, why not add Rally Finland to the list and try to have fun on these beautiful roads? I will be at the start in four or five weeks.”

The Frenchman’s plan after that event is yet to be confirmed, although Ogier did suggest that he would compete in Chile in September, which would be a seventh WRC start this year.

Ogier has stipulated that he has no plans to mirror last year, when he contested 10 of the 13 rounds after Toyota asked him to extend his programme to help the team’s fight for the manufacturers’ title.

This year Ogier remains firmly in the title race, sitting second in the standings, nine points behind team-mate Elfyn Evans despite sitting out Rally Sweden and Safari Rally Kenya. Ogier has already taken victories in Monte Carlo, Portugal and Sardinia, while finishing second in the Canary Islands and Greece has proved an impressive points haul from five events to date.

“If everything had gone perfectly for us we would have been very close maybe but winning [Acropolis Rally Greece] was not really possible, so well done to Ott Tanak and his team for the discipline,” said Ogier after his Greek result.

“I think the points average is quite unbelievable [this year]. My average points must be close to perfection so I have to be pleased with that and that is why we are still second in the championship.”