In the title race, the top five places are occupied by Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT drivers; amongst them is the reigning champion and the driver with the #1 on his side windows, who is likely to retain the title even if he completes the remaining events of the year.
Welshman Elfyn Evans arrives in Paraguay with 201 points, followed by Finland’s Sami Pajari on 171 points; Japan’s Takamoto Katsuta is slightly further back on 160 points, followed by Sweden’s Oliver Solberg on 156 points, whilst France’s Sébastien Ogier rounds off the ‘top five’ on 139 points.
The entire Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT line-up has dominated with an iron fist, as all its drivers have won at least one round so far this year. In chronological order, the victories went to Solberg (Monaco), Evans (Sweden and Japan), Katsuta (Kenya and Croatia), Ogier (Spain and Greece) and Pajari (Estonia and Finland). The only driver to temporarily break this dominance was Thierry Neuville in Portugal, at the wheel of his Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT i20 N Rally1.
With 35 points up for grabs – bringing the total to 140 at the end of the four rounds – the battle to be the first champion of the WRC27 era remains mathematically open to anyone, although in Ogier’s case, this depends strictly on an ‘unintentional sacrifice’ involving poor results from the rest of the team on the gravel leg of the season.
Thanks to the battle for the drivers’ championship, a record that remained unbroken for almost three and a half decades could be equalled this very season. In the Manufacturers’ Championship, Toyota leads with 514 points to Hyundai’s 340. If they dominate in Paraguay, they will secure the necessary margin to be crowned Champions once again with a special touch.
Although mathematically it is virtually a done deal, Toyota could secure in Paraguay nothing less than its tenth manufacturers’ title and its seventh since returning to the FIA World Rally Championship in 2017 under its current structure. The Japanese firm won titles in 1993, 1994 and 1999 as the Toyota Castrol Team, and the rest as Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT in 2018, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025.
Until this year, the record had been held by Lancia, which won its last world constructors’ title in 1992, although the drivers’ championship was won by the Spaniard Carlos Sainz in a Toyota Celica ST185. The Finn Juha Kankkunen, driving the Lancia Delta HF Integrale, was the world runner-up, whilst his team-mate, the Frenchman Didier Auriol, finished third; both were the drivers who shouldered the responsibility that year, when the Martini Lancia team had several names in its ranks, including the Argentine Jorge Recalde, the Swede Björn Waldegård and the Frenchman Philippe Bugalski, amongst others.
And what’s your prediction for the WRC or the Paraguay Rally?
