Tänak took control while others lost it

2025 had been the Toyota show, but Ott Tänak took the show off-air in Greece

Photography by Hyundai, Toyota, M-Sport & DirtFish

Words by Alasdair Lindsay, Head of Digital Strategy

This year had been the Toyota show. Sébastien Ogier: three wins. Elfyn Evans: two wins. Kalle Rovanperä: imperious on Canarian asphalt.

If you were an Alzenau native, it would have been easy to become fed up. Portugal was a near miss: Ott Tänak seemed in command until the power steering on his i20 failed. Adrien Fourmaux had been in the mix until a suspension component broke. In Sardinia, Neuville ruined his rally on stage five and Fourmaux spiralled out of control. It was painful because it was apparent the underlying pace was still there.

Hyundai’s most recent win heading to Greece was last year’s Central European Rally. But the last time Hyundai had been able to put its foot down and say it was dictating the narrative was Lamia the previous September. Thierry Neuville had been decisive. Sébastien Ogier had tried to get in his head and failed, suggesting the Belgian “cried” too much about road position. Neuville deflected the noise and triumphed – and off towards the drivers’ championship title Neuville went.

Acropolis 2025 transpired to be a repeat of sorts – but for one of the other i20 N Rally1s. With a performance equal parts rapid and controlled, Tänak’s win is a definitive moment in the title race. He took control while others lost it.

Tänak has finally taken the Toyota show off-air. On his current run, he may be dominating the airwaves until the summer break.

Neuville’s 2024 title run had been built on making the best out of bad situations. When Tänak ran into trouble in Portugal, he still finished second anyway. He did it again in Sardinia. And in Greece, he simply outclassed everyone.

The clues were there before he set off towards Athens for the opening superspecial. Colin Clark was on the mic chatting Takamoto Katsuta’s ear off in the media pen, with Tänak patiently waiting behind him in the queue to speak to DirtFish. We hear so much – and in the past, have seen so much – of a dour-faced Tänak giving the media short shrift. But this Tänak, having a minute to glance around his surroundings, was smiling. By the time he was on the mic with Colin, asking some of our less serious questions, he was beaming. Look at our preview video on YouTube below and you’ll see the reaction.

Mentality makes such a difference. Tänak’s seems to be the best it’s ever been. Séb Ogier’s is as strong as ever. Elsewhere in the Rally1 elite, less so.

The contrast was stark with Kalle Rovanperä. Prime Tänak was demonstrating the seemingly effortless domination that won him the 2019 title; meanwhile, Rovanperä’s God-mode that won him two world titles had left the chat. He was, by his own admission, “tired”. On the road section before Sunday’s first stage, there was a moment where, finally, Rovanperä looked cheerful amongst the stresses of the Acropolis. It’s because he was chatting drifting with Aaron Johnston.

The second the word “Supra” was mentioned – Rovanperä’s car of choice when he entered Drift Masters Europe – his face finally lit up like Tänak’s had before the rally began. When it came to talking rally in media zones? Nothing. The face he put on was a brave one – but going off the road and retiring in between punctures on Friday and Sunday was crushing his spirit.

There is no doubt Rovanperä still knows how to drive. Juha Kankkunen keeps stressing as much. But right now that pace is locked away behind frustrations around getting the tires to work and getting himself in a mental flow state again.

The smile was missing from Rovanperä's face in Greece

In the Hyundai camp, patience was running out and nerves were fraying. Neuville was utterly incensed at getting his second puncture on Friday and lashed out at TV stage-end interviewer Paul King accordingly. By the time we spoke to him at the media zone he’d had some time to reflect and calm down.

You never want to start an interview with a driver on a negative note. They’ll shut down and you’ll get nothing out of them. So I tried with Thierry to find some crumb of comfort to get us started. He went searching for the negative anyway.

It was hard to tell what was more deflated: the tires, or him. This was not the Thierry Neuville that battled through every setback last year and came out the other side with something to show for it. Now, his opportunity to mount a fightback has faded to the point it’s barely visible: he isn’t a fan of the next two rallies (Estonia and Finland) and somehow has to claw back 56 points as we head into Toyota’s back yard.

Fourmaux meanwhile was under a different kind of pressure. He wasn’t fighting to keep his title hopes alive: he was fighting to prove he could still deliver the bare minimum his team expected. After a disastrous Saturday in Sardinia, he’d resorted to simply hiding away inside his i20 N Rally1 at Olbia’s final media zone – we failed to get a word.

In Greece, the mood had shifted: he’d had some long discussions with his sports psychologist to work through the issues. But Cyril Abiteboul is a man who cuts to the chase and had laid out expectations: a proper result is the minimum expectation.

Fourmaux took a moment of quiet reflection before heading into Saturday's stages

On road sections there’s plenty of work to do for both co-driver and driver: swap tires, check pressures, a last look at the notes, or maybe checking in on live television pictures to look for any potential trouble spots. On Saturday morning, nestled away under the trees in a laybay on the outskirts of Pavliani, Fourmaux was doing none of these. He was sat alone on a bench, contemplating. In Acropolis, the bare minimum is to manage tire wear, puncture risk and impact damage. Fourmaux was also having to manage his mind.

Clipping a bank and damaging the right-rear corner risked a repeat of old issues. Would he keep it together? Whenever incidents like this happened, he’d lose focus and compound his woe. Mercifully, that didn’t happen, though he still seemed slightly flustered on the final day. He’d lost more time to Elfyn Evans than planned on the first pass of Tarzan and, with two stages to go, risked having to defend his third position rather than keep it.

The release of tension when they crossed the flying finish of Tarzan for a second time was clear. Nothing had gone right since January: six months of problems could finally be put behind him, a disastrous streak finally over. His Canarias performance relative to his team-mates had been good but the car was not at the races; where the car had been up to scratch, he hadn’t taken the opportunity available.

Fourmaux had been able to escape his mental prison. M-Sport, however, is still chained to the wall. Running last on the road for three consecutive gravel events with heavy cleaning had provided an opportunity to pack some uplifting high points into what – given the team’s economic position – was always going to be a slog.

M-Sport's event was a slog in Greece

It’s admirable that Grégoire Munster and Louis Louka are able to put a brave face on the season. We put together driver ratings because you, the fans, tell us you want them. That can put us in the awkward situation with the drivers. But Louis is one who gets that it’s nothing personal; with good humor he signed off a brief chat that he was expecting something better than a two out of 10 for himself and Grég.

Their plan was classic Acropolis: be ultra-cautious, avoid punctures and broken parts at all costs, and wait as rivals simply disappeared off the leaderboard with issues. It was working: they were fifth. Then the handbrake failed. Then an issue with the fuel system – one which others in the service park too – struck them down entirely. So, Louis, don’t worry: the rating will be in the upper half of that scale this time.

Less resilient was Mārtiņš Sesks. His final media zone interview was a tense affair. He now picks up the mantle Fourmaux was able to ditch with his Greece podium: the driver without a meaningful result over an extended period.

His world must feel like it is collapsing around him: on the first gravel stage of the last three rallies his event has fallen apart, twice with punctures and once with his monumental shunt in Sardinia. His stress is understandable: the dream he didn’t dare consider two years ago and suddenly came to pass after star turns in Poland and Latvia last year is quickly vanishing again. He has one test day and then comes one of his last chances to remind us of what he is capable of in a Rally1 car: Estonia.

Tänak’s seemingly effortless domination was matched by only one other person in Greece. And it wasn’t a direct rival – for now. Oliver Solberg was similarly unperturbed. Metronomic in his consistency, winning stages while driving in a manner protective of his equipment and untroubled by the massive spate of punctures top Rally2 contenders like Emil Lindholm and Robert Virves faced on Friday morning, he put in the kind of performance most of the Rally1 field needed from its drivers but didn’t get.

A gearbox issue on the final stage for Tänak was but a footnote. This was his show – but it should possibly have been Solberg’s too, had he been in the big brother of his GR Yaris Rally2. It could have been Pajari’s time to shine as well were his opportunity to lay down a marker not been robbed by the same fuel-related problems that beset Sesks and Munster.

Tänak’s frown has been turned upside down. Fourmaux could finally breathe again. Toyota, finally, was not the story. Hyundai was – both for good and bad. And M-Sport, sadly, was the same story again. But even when not making headlines, Ogier reminded us that, if he felt like it, he could go off and win another world title. Kankkunen confirmed that for any rally Séb feels like showing up, there will be a Yaris Rally1 made available.

The 2019 world champion has reason to be content. He knows he has the measure of his closest title rival on gravel right now – and that rival isn’t even going to show up all the time. If Séb couldn’t beat him in a straight fight, who else is going to?

The stage wins list makes for interesting reading. Toyota dominance? Absent. Ott Tänak: 46. Sébastien Ogier: 30. Kalle Rovanperä: 26 (15 of which were in Canarias). Adrien Fourmaux: 15. Elfyn Evans: 14.

A few months from now we might forget we’d once been watching the Toyota show. It’s starting to feel more and more like Tänak time.

Words:Alasdair Lindsay

Tags: Acropolis Rally Greece, Acropolis Rally Greece 2025, WRC, WRC 2025

Publish Date June 30, 2025 DirtFish https://dirtfish-editorial.s3-accelerate.amazonaws.com/2025/06/Hxdz6gcG-2025ACROPOLIS_RT_157-780x520.jpg June 30, 2025

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