TOYOTA GAZOO Racing World Rally Team is preparing to discover unfamiliar roads in South America when the FIA World Rally Championship visits Paraguay for the first time on August 28-31.
The Rally del Paraguay will be the first of two consecutive rounds on South American gravel, with cars to then be transported over the Andes mountains to compete in Rally Chile just two weeks later.
Having completed an intense run of European rallies with a perfect 1-2-3-4-5 result on home roads at Rally Finland earlier this month, TGR-WRT travels to South America with its full fleet of five GR YARIS Rally1 cars – back in their regular all-black livery after a lighter silver summer scheme was used on the previous events.
With five rounds remaining in the 2025 season, the team has a lead of 87 points in the manufacturers’ championship, and three drivers leading the way in the title race. Elfyn Evans is back in the lead of the drivers’ standings, with Kalle Rovanperä just three points behind after his home win at Rally Finland. Sébastien Ogier is 10 points further back in third, level with Hyundai driver Ott Tänak.
These three drivers will compete for manufacturers’ points, supported by Takamoto Katsuta – fresh from a strong second-place finish in Finland. Sami Pajari joins his team-mates in competing in all black for the next two rallies, even though his car remains entered under the TGR-WRT2 banner.
A strong pack of eight GR Yaris Rally2 cars are also entered in WRC2. Championship leader Oliver Solberg (Printsport) of Sweden is joined in making the trip by Poland’s Kajetan Kajetanowicz (Rallylab Technology) and Bolivian Marco Bulacia (Delta Rally) while five cars are driven by Paraguayans: WRC2 regular Diego Domínguez Jr (Teo Martín Motorsport) joined by TOYOTA GAZOO Racing Paraguay duo Alejandro Galanti and Tiago Weiler, Gustavo Saba (Saba Competición) and Diego Domínguez Sr (DTA Rally Team).
The rally will be based in the south of Paraguay in the city of Encarnación, situated on the banks of the Paraná river and the border with Argentina. The route is formed by roads that have previously featured in Rally Trans Itapúa but will be a trip into the unknown for the Rally1 teams and drivers. The stages are expected to be generally fast, with some more technical sections through dense forest, while the red earth surface should be smooth but soft – meaning that deep ruts could form for the second pass of stages in particular.
After a ceremonial start on Thursday evening in Encarnación, the rally begins on Friday when 140.9 competitive kilometres will be driven across two loops of four stages. The loop ends with a super special stage at the Autodromo Alfredo Scheid, which will be run for a third and final time at the end of Saturday morning. Saturday’s route is otherwise formed by a trio of stages to the west each run twice, before Sunday’s finale features a pair of repeated stages to the north-east.
Quotes:
Juha Kankkunen (Deputy Team Principal)
“Rally Finland was an incredible result for us and a strong performance by our drivers, and it’s giving the whole team good confidence as we enter the last part of the season. In the drivers’ championship, it’s still very close and exciting, with only 13 points covering the top four drivers – in Elfyn, Kalle and Seb we have three very strong contenders. Hopefully Takamoto and Sami can continue with the confidence and speed they had in Finland too. Paraguay will be something new for everyone, and nobody really knows what to expect there. What we do know whenever we go to South America is the passion that there is for rallying there – this is something I always remember from competing myself in Argentina. Like Argentina, it seems like the stages could be quite fast, but on a new rally we always need to be prepared for some surprises.”