New Junior ERC champion Calle Carlberg kept his promise to deliver Opel Junior ERC title and is now targeting JWRC glory
Photography by Red Bull
Words by Luke Barry
Calle Carlberg should consider making more promises to people if his last one’s anything to go by.
Coming to the end of his prize-drive season in Junior ERC, courtesy of winning Opel e-Rally Cup the previous year, he saw his rallying opportunities disappearing for 2025.
“I had the full support of Opel Motorsport, but we just needed to convince the marketing team that we were able to put some money towards a second season,” Carlberg tells DirtFish.
“And to be honest, the convincing was that I promised them that I would win the championship. If they let me have a chance, then I would give them a championship. And that was some big pressure this year, but in the end, it worked out!”
Last weekend, 25-year-old Carlberg celebrated becoming Junior ERC champion with one round to spare, after a dominant campaign where he won thrice and was the undisputed class of the field.
Victory in Hungary was Callberg's first of three consecutive Junior ERC triumphs
His prize – like Jean-Baptiste Franceschi, Laurent Pellier, Norbert Maior and Mille Johansson before him – is a funded drive in next year’s Junior WRC.
Before we dive into Carlberg’s winning season and his thoughts on the future, it’s important to understand where he’s come from.
Going rallying is never simple for anyone, but for Carlberg it means sacrificing every other part of his life. But as you could probably have guessed, he has no regrets.
“In rallying, everyone knows it takes a lot of resources to only be at the startline,” the Swede says. “And from my side, I don’t really come from a family with a background in business or with a lot of money, so we have had to go the long way and to work very hard to be able to get where we are.
“I’m 25 years old. I’m still living at home. I don’t own anything. I don’t have a normal job. Everything is just for rallying. I’m sacrificing all my life just to be able to do this.”
Carlberg started out in Sweden driving a variety of cars, before some support from 2020 Junior WRC champion Tom Kristensson helped him make the step into international rallying where he now belongs.
“It’s a big sacrifice, but I don’t regret this,” Carlberg continues. “I really love what I’m doing and I’m able to call this, let’s say, my job. I’m not earning basically any money from it, but I can survive, but not more than that. And it’s just, it’s wonderful. It’s really great.”
If you’re not a rallying person, then it’s hard to understand that mindset. But you and I would 100% be living our lives like Calle if we could. I’m not sure we could be winning rallies like him though…
With three victories, a second place (by only three seconds) and 34 stage wins (more than three times the next-best driver Jaspar Vaher), Carlberg has blown his opposition away in the Junior ERC this campaign.
And he even won a rally outright in Canada driving a Rally4 car!
Finishing only second in Spain was the catalyst for Carlberg's victory streak
“I didn’t expect to be this fast compared to the other guys,” Carlberg admits. “I thought maybe I can win on consistency, but maybe not the speed. But in the end, we showed both. So I surprised myself, for sure. I didn’t think it would go this well.”
The trigger for success was Rally Sierra Morena to kickstart the season. Missing out to local driver Sergi Pérez by such a small margin, Carlberg experienced a feeling he didn’t want to repeat.
“I decided that since that day, I didn’t want to lose another rally,” he smiles. “And, yeah, I think after that we won four straight events – three in the ERC. And we were on our way to win a fourth straight event in the ERC, in Barum, but in the end, the driveshaft is nothing I can do [anything] about. But it’s been a really good season.”
Few experience a serene run to their championship crowning moment when in a position like Carlberg.
Needing just a modest eighth-place finish to get the job done at Barum Rally Zlín, Carlberg was leading when the driveshaft in his Opel Corsa Rally4 broke.
Not everything went to plan on Barum Rally Zlín
“I thought OK, now the championship is over. And then I reminded myself, no, we’re still in a good position. It doesn’t matter,” Carlberg recalls.
“But I thought I couldn’t win it in Barum, which would put a lot of pressure in Croatia. But then after some time standing there on stage six, we started to count and then we saw, OK, I think maybe it’s possible still. If we just finish tomorrow, then it’s still possible. So then, you know, it didn’t feel good, but it felt a little bit better.”
It’s amazing how the competitive human mind works. With the adrenalin pumping, Carlberg forgot all about his strong championship position – boosted by Vaher crashing a couple of stages earlier – and was frustrated instead.
“I think I’m a perfectionist as well,” he adds. “I really wanted to win the rally to have a really good result [to go with the championship]. And I’m also that guy: I go into eWRC so many times and I check the results, even though I know exactly what the places have been.
“But I want to check and I see, OK, P1, P1, P1. And I think it just looks so good! So it’s… you know, the second place in Spain has been haunting me for a long while and this driveshaft will still continue to haunt me! It hurt quite a bit, but in the end, it doesn’t matter at all. Just for, basically, my head, it would have been nice.”
Those thoughts were parked on Sunday, when Carlberg and his father Torbjörn (a stand-in for regular co-driver Jørgen Eriksen who was an expectant father) leapt onto the roof at the end of the final stage.
DirtFish understands Carlberg celebrated the success in suitable style, but even a few days on he still hadn’t come to terms with what he’d done.
“To be honest, I don’t feel anything because I haven’t realized it yet,” he says. “I mean when I see articles, like ERC are posting videos of when we finished, I get reminded of the feelings again. But I don’t feel like I understood that I’m, at the moment, the best junior in Europe.
“My friend also told me, currently, you’re the best two-wheel-drive driver in Europe. And I… I can’t really get my mind around it. It feels super, super-strange. So I think it will take quite a long time until it sinks in and I really understand what it means.”
Just wait until it dawns on Carlberg that he’s going to be competing in the world championship in 2026!
A season as dominant as Carlberg's would be enough to make anyone smile from ear to ear
“I’m already working on next year, but I’m not thinking that, you know, seeing that I will be in the junior world championship, it feels just so strange,” he says.
“Like I get the imposter syndrome, that I don’t belong here really. It’s crazy. I haven’t realized it yet. I think I have some time now, some months before the Junior WRC starts where I can… I hope it will sink in.”
Carlberg intends to complete the Junior ERC season by competing on October’s Croatia Rally, mainly so he can also clinch the ERC4 championship which is still up for grabs.
Then it’ll be time to step up to the WRC, which he has never competed in before. But Mille Johansson is fighting for this year’s Junior WRC title, so has proved you can jump from Junior ERC and immediately be competitive.
Carlberg plans to emulate 2024 Junior ERC champion Johansson and fight for next year's JWRC title
Carlberg is backing himself to be in the fight in 2026.
“Without wishing to sound too arrogant, I feel quite comfortable that I’m not going there to gain experience. I’m going there to try and win the championship. That’s my goal,” he vows.
“I have no idea who the competitors [will be] and how difficult it will be. It’s longer rallies, often more difficult rallies, so anything can happen, but I’m hoping that I will be there to fight for the championship and that’s the goal from my side.
“You know, if I don’t win that championship, I think it’s quite difficult for me to continue or to find a way to stay in the world championship. So for me, there’s only one way that I can go about it.”
Those should be menacing words for whoever is going up against Carlberg next season. Because if 2025 has proved anything, when Carlberg makes a promise he’s going to end up keeping it.
Words:Luke Barry
Tags: Barum Czech Rally Zlin 2025, Calle Carlberg, ERC, ERC 2025, Junior ERC, WRC, WRC 2026
Publish Date August 22, 2025 DirtFish
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