In the next year, Kalle Rovanperä will be more distant from the World Rally Championship (WRC), opting for a partial program alternating with Sébastien Ogier in the third Toyota – despite having renewed with the manufacturer for several years. After two consecutive titles, still in the early stages of his career at the highest level at only 23 years old, it is a somewhat surprising decision. But it has its reasons, naturally.
And the Finn justified himself in a statement: ‘Next year I will only compete in a few rallies and the biggest reason for this is that I have been driving rally cars for 15 years, which is a long time, and although the last seasons have been incredible, of course, they have also been very mentally and physically demanding. So I felt that now would be a good time to take a year to recharge my batteries, and then return full-time to fight for the title once again in full attack’.
This does not mean that Rovanperä will be idle when he does not have commitments in the WRC next year, as he himself stated: ‘I like all forms of motorsport and I am looking forward to doing some drifting and maybe other cool events as well, as well as the rallies we will select next year’.
