Autosportfoto

Bumper entry in Portugal

Fourteen World Rally Cars feature among the 88 entries for the fifth round of the FIA World Rally Championship, with equally strong line-ups in the WRC 2 and Junior WRC support categories.

Manufacturer series leaders Hyundai Shell Mobis World Rally Team takes four i20 cars to the Matosinhos-based event. Hayden Paddon returns for the first time since February's Rally Sweden, replacing Dani Sordo in Hyundai's nominated points-scoring trio.

Teemu Suninen is alongside regulars Sébastien Ogier and Elfyn Evans for the M-Sport Ford squad, while Mads Østberg joins Kris Meeke and Craig Breen in the Citroën Total Abu Dhabi team for his second appearance of the year in a C3.

Toyota Gazoo Racing fields its usual trio of Jari-Matti Latvala, Ott Tänak and Esapekka Lappi. Saudi Arabia's Yazeed Al Rajhi drives an older 2016-specification Fiesta World Rally Car.

Seventeen competitors are entered in WRC 2, headed by championship leader Pontus Tidemand. Youngster Juuso Nordgren will partner the Swede in the Skoda Motorsport line-up, the Finn making his first appearance of the year.

Simone Tempestini kicks off his WRC 2 campaign, but not in Citroën's new C3 R5 as planned. The French manufacturer does not have a car available for this round and so the Romanian pilot will drive a Fiesta.

The Junior WRC boasts 14 drivers, all in identical Fiesta R2 cars, headed by championship leader Dennis Rådström and WRC 3 pace-setter Jean-Baptiste Franceschi.

The four-day rally features 20 special stages covering 358.19km and we'll begin our build-up on wrc.com tomorrow (Wednesday).

Zdroj: wrc.com