Rally de Portugal integrates the World Cup for the 14th consecutive time – Observer
The 55th edition of the Rally de Portugal will be played between the 19th and 22nd of May 2022, integrating for the 14th consecutive time the calendar of the world rally championship (WRC), announced this Friday the organization.
Uninterruptedly present at the Worlds since 2008, despite its cancellation in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Rally de Portugal will be the fourth stage of the championship, the first on land and gravel.
The 2022 Worlds starts, as traditionally, in Monaco, with the Monte Carlo Rally, between 20 and 23 January, followed by the tests in Sweden and Croatia, before the Portuguese rally, and ends between 10 and 13 November , in Japan, which had not been part of the calendar since 2010.
Also New Zealand is once again part of a competition, from which it was absent since 2009.
The calendar for the 2022 World Cup was approved this Friday by the FIA’s world motor sport council, with the WRC general director, Jona Siebel, highlighting the integration of hybrid cars.
“Next year will be memorable and exciting for the FIA WRC by including the new hybrid cars of the Rally1 era, integrating the regulations for a greener and more sustainable future”, added the general director of the competition.
The official also praised the return of the New Zealand rally, in the 50th edition of the World Cup, in another year of recovery after the impact caused by the new coronavirus.
“Unfortunately, the pandemic has brought the world to its knees. But as the world recovers, so does the WRC. We had devised a strategy for the equal distribution of races between Europe and other destinations and the 2022 calendar is an important step in this direction”, stressed Siebel.
Before the interruption in 2020, the Portuguese rally had been held since 1967 and was part of the world championship in 41 editions, the first of which in 1973.
Excluding as the first six, the longest in the World Cup occurred between 2002 and 2006, having also been excluded in 2008, under the rotation policy then in force.
The Finnish Markku Alén and the French Sébastien Ogier, seven times world champion and current leader of the championship, are the drivers with the most victories in the Portuguese race, with five victories each.