Tarmac hasn't been Josh McErlean's strongest surface in 2025, but Japan's another opportunity to improve
Photography by M-Sport
Words by Luke Barry
Drivers’ nationalities can carry assumptions with them about where they’re most comfortable in a rally car.
Take newly-crowned Junior WRC champion Mille Johansson as an example. His epic final stage performance in Central European Rally was utterly incredible, but it’s tempting to believe it was also unexpected considering Swedes aren’t naturally associated with Tarmac.
Except Johansson has done lots of Tarmac driving in his earlier years, and actually told DirtFish prior to CER that gravel was his least-favored surface.
M-Sport Rally1 driver Josh McErlean is another case. Hailing from Ireland where the Tarmac championship is practically a religion, the loose assumption to make is the loose rallies are not his favored.
But as McErlean remarked: “I think you can count on my hands how many Irish events I’ve done.”
In reality, Tarmac has been the 26-year-old’s biggest weakness since jumping up to the Rally1 class in 2025.
McErlean has been the least competitive Rally1 driver on each Tarmac event so far this year
At both the Monte Carlo Rally and Rally Islas Canarias, McErlean was beaten on pace by Rally2 cars early on before recovering to run ahead. By comparison Central European Rally – falling six months after the Canaries – was a big improvement, but the Irishman was still the least competitive Rally1 driver.
“We know Tarmac has always been tricky,” McErlean told DirtFish. “We were over two seconds a kilometer down in Canaries, which was a disaster. On some of these stages [at CER], I think the first one on Sunday morning, we were 0.7 [seconds per kilometer] to Ogier, which is a big step from Canaries.
“OK, it’s slightly different in terms of character, but, yeah, at least it’s going in the right direction.”
A key reason he’s found Tarmac such a struggle relative to gravel is the increased impetus on the aerodynamic package.
McErlean explained: “I think it’s just trusting, trusting everything. Trusting the grip, trusting how much you can push these cars and how much speed you can carry, especially through the fast stuff and also the pollution as well because, OK, downforce works on normal dry Tarmac but it also helps you push through the mud as well and keeps the car stuck to the road.
“So yeah, it’s just trying to shift your mind and get used to it.”
McErlean's pace improved greatly at Central European Rally
CER a fortnight ago and Japan next week affords drivers their only back-to-back opportunity to drive on Tarmac in the WRC this season. That’s welcome news for McErlean and co-driver Eoin Treacy.
“We want to start in Japan where we left off in CER and keep on going. Japan’s a bit cleaner, which should help. And yeah, we’ll go there and enjoy the culture.
“The target is to get under 0.5s/km in some stages. We can’t look at results yet because we know how dominant the other cars are at the moment, but hopefully we get closer to them again.”
Ironically while McErlean’s speed has been stronger on gravel, two of his best three results this year have been on Tarmac. He finished seventh in both Monte Carlo and Central Europe as well as Finland.
Words:Luke Barry
Tags: Josh McErlean, M-Sport, WRC, WRC 2025
Publish Date October 30, 2025 DirtFish
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