The Latest Breaking News from Autosport

1. Kalle Rovanpera at his very best is Sebastien Loeb-like

For a sport that takes place at a frenetic pace, the speed of change in motorsport can be remarkably slow at times. Traditions are well established and are often religiously stuck to with very few daring to break the mould. Yet trying something new is important to keep offering fresh…

Autosport revealed over the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend that the idea of introducing a mechanism to equalise power units among the manufacturers has been tabled by the FIA for discussion at this week’s meeting of the F1 Commission. 

The high-speed gravel rally is likely to be omitted from the 2024 calendar with neighbouring Latvia already confirmed to be joining next year’s schedule. Long-time European Rally Championship event, Rally Liepaja, is expected to take Estonia’s place.

Including last year’s Abu Dhabi GP triumph, Red Bull has won the last 12 races which surpasses McLaren’s 11 straight victories set during the 1988 season.

Tanak was handed a five-minute penalty when his M-Sport team were forced to change the engine on his Ford Puma after it developed a significant fault during Thursday’s shakedown before the rally had begun.

The reigning world champion made light work of sweeping the fast gravel stages to end Friday with a 3.0s lead over Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville heading into Saturday’s nine stages.

Tanak has largely dominated the times to claim six of the event’s eight stages to date, winning five of Friday’s seven tests including a clean sweep of the morning loop.

Toyota's championship leader Rovanpera and M-Sport rival Tanak headed into the event as the overwhelming favourites to challenge for the win on Estonia’s fast gravel roads.

Toyota will debut its new engine update at this weekend’s Rally Estonia after the reigning world champions elected to use one of its homologation jokers to make the change.

Lappi suffered three failures related to the i20 N Rally1’s prop shaft that ultimately curtailed a realistic shot at a podium, while shining a spotlight on the team’s reliability concerns.