Day 1
Kalle Rovanperä was in a league of his own as he led a stunning Toyota clean sweep through Friday’s opening leg of Rally Islas Canarias.
The Finn, alongside co-driver Jonne Halttunen, topped the timesheets on all six of the day’s speed tests to build a commanding lead of 26.8sec. All five of Toyota’s GR Yaris Rally1 cars ended the day ahead of their rivals from Hyundai Motorsport and M-Sport Ford, completing a dominant showing for the Japanese marque.
It was a frustrating day for Fourmaux and wider Hyundai team – with the Frenchman falling to eighth on the final stage behind his colleagues Thierry Neuville and Ott Tänak.
All three struggled to extract performance from the hard compound Hankook Ventus Z215 tyres, with set-up issues leaving them over a minute adrift of the lead and searching for solutions overnight.
Day 2
Rovanperä strengthened his pursuit of a first FIA World Rally Championship victory of the 2025 season with another flawless drive on Saturday.
The Toyota GAZOO Racing star remains firmly on course to become the first-ever winner of a WRC round held on Gran Canarian soil. He will carry a commanding 45.2sec advantage into Sunday’s five-stage final leg, leading an all-GR Yaris Rally1 top four.
Arriving at this fourth round 57 points adrift of the championship lead, Rovanperä has found a rhythm that nobody else has been able to match.
He won six of Saturday’s asphalt stages to almost double his overnight advantage — which stood at 26.8sec on Friday — before Elfyn Evans prevented a clean sweep by topping the evening’s super special inside the Gran Canaria Arena. Even so, Rovanperä has claimed victory on 12 of the 13 stages run so far.
Evans holds third place, 22.9sec down on Ogier, with Takamoto Katsuta a further 35.8sec adrift. Toyota looked set to lock out the top five before Sami Pajari crashed into a wooden barrier on the penultimate stage, retiring after having held fourth overall.
Benefiting from Pajari’s retirement, Fourmaux now occupies fifth despite stalling in the last stage, and trails Katsuta by 25.7sec, while Neuville and Tänak remain within touching distance of the Frenchman.
Elsewhere, Grégoire Munster’s hopes took a hit when he required spectator assistance after running wide and beaching his M-Sport Ford Puma Rally1 on SS10.
The incident cost him three minutes and dropped him to 13th overall, promoting WRC2 frontrunners Yohan Rossel and Alejandro Cachón, as well as Munster’s team-mate Josh McErlean, into eighth, ninth, and 10th respectively.
Day 3
Rovanperä cemented his first win of the win by claiming a dominant victory at Rally Islas Canarias on Sunday.
The Finn, who arrived at this fourth round — host to the WRC for the first time — almost 60 points adrift of the championship lead, slashed that deficit to 43 after a commanding start-to-finish performance vaulted him and co-driver Jonne Halttunen from sixth to second in the standings.
Rovanperä’s triumph – only his second on asphalt – was secured by 53.5 over Toyota GAZOO Racing team-mate Sébastien Ogier and marked his return to the top step for the first time since Rally Chile Bío Bío seven months ago.
Elfyn Evans completed the podium, 23.6sec adrift of Ogier, further extending his championship lead, while Takamoto Katsuta rounded out a top-four lockout for the GR Yaris Rally1 squad, finishing 45.8sec behind Evans.
It proved to be a frustrating week for Hyundai, with all three of its i20 N Rally1 drivers struggling to challenge for the podium after encountering handling issues believed to be related to differential settings.
Adrien Fourmaux was the Korean marque’s top finisher in fifth, although the Frenchman trailed Rovanperä by over 2min 30sec at the end. Team-mates Ott Tänak and Thierry Neuville followed in sixth and seventh respectively.
WRC2 frontrunners Yohan Rossel, Alejandro Cachón and Nikolay Gryazin completed the top 10, while M-Sport Ford Puma Rally1 driver Grégoire Munster recovered to 11th following an off-road excursion on Saturday.
Munster’s team-mate, Josh McErlean, failed to make the finish after crashing into an Armco barrier on Sunday’s opening stage.
