The Royal Rally of Scandinavia was run in the same region that used to host Sweden’s World Rally Championship round. In recent years, however, the WRC event has been held in Umeå. Although many of Korhonen’s rivals knew the roads like the back of their hands, the Finnish driver, competing in Värmland for the first time, showed good pace.
Korhonen finished second in the rally, just 4.9 seconds behind the winner, Eyvind Brynildsen. Hailing from Laukaa, a rally village in Central Finland, Korhonen also claimed victory on the event-ending Power Stage.
Korhonen has now contested two European Rally Championship events in his career, with results of one win and one second place.
“It was a really challenging rally. There was extremely little grip. The local guys were surprisingly quick. We hadn’t driven here before. You really had to push as hard as you could,” Korhonen told RallyJournal.com
“The roads here are great. Compared to Finland, they are a bit more demanding because the speed is high but there’s no room. The roads are narrower. If you make a mistake, it costs you a lot. Overall, we drove pretty well throughout the rally. There was one small incident, but luckily only the rim was damaged.”
Korhonen celebrated victory at the previous ERC round in Hungary. In Sweden too, he came close to winning in terms of the time difference, but in fact, the battle for victory may have slipped away already on Friday. Korhonen struggled especially in the morning with the set-up of his car.
“The beginning of the rally was a bit painful because the driving didn’t flow perfectly, but the main struggle was with the car. We had quite big problems with rear-end grip,” Korhonen explained.
“We still tried to push as much as we could. We managed to change the car in Friday’s midday service and it started working better. We also suffered a bit with our starting position. For Saturday, we got a better starting position and the stages came in a better rhythm overall.”
Thanks to his win and second place, Korhonen climbed to the lead of the European Rally Championship standings, even though he didn’t compete in the season opener in Córdoba. The Finnish driver’s programme also includes the next ERC round in Poland, which will also be run on gravel. Korhonen already competed in Poland last year when the event was part of the World Rally Championship calendar.
Could it be possible that the remaining four asphalt rallies of the season will also be added to Korhonen’s programme in the ERC if the championship opportunity is still alive after the Rally Poland?
“We are indeed leading the ERC standings now. Poland is the next ERC rally. Of course, after that we’ll discuss whether it would be possible to compete more, but with the current information, there are no other rallies planned apart from these gravel events.”
