The message a WRC stalwart sent which its new king couldn’t answer

Sebastien Ogier might be the outgoing World Rally champion, but it didn’t stop him reminding everyone of the skills that made him an eight-time world champion. As victory at Rally Spain led Toyota’s charge to a titles clean sweep, it did pose a question to newly-crowned champion Kalle Rovanpera which he could not answer

The 2022 World Rally Championship has largely been the 'Kalle Rovanpera show', but in Spain last weekend Sebastien Ogier reminded everyone that the eight-time world champion has still got it. For a period, the thousands of fans that flocked to what is now likely to be the last Rally Spain for some time were treated to a fascinating contest. New world champion Rovanpera versus the outgoing world champion Ogier.

After Rovanpera comprehensively beat Ogier on New Zealand's wet gravel to become the youngest WRC champion, the changing of the baton was complete. But the smooth sinuous Spanish asphalt roads offered Ogier, back on his favoured asphalt that has yielded plenty of success over his glittering career, a chance to roll back the years.

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Author Tom Howard

Tom Howard is a News Editor working across both Autosport.com and Motorsport.com websites. Starting out as a sports reporter in local newspapers, Tom focussed on motorsport covering several national championships in the UK, including the BTCC.

After a period working as a freelance journalist, Tom moved to Australia in 2013 landing a job at leading Australian motorsport news outlet speedcafe.com, covering international motorsport events including F1, WRC and Supercars. Progressing to Editor in 2017, Tom was named Motorsport Australia Journalist of the Year for his work. He is also a two-time winner of Supercars Journalist of The Year (2017,2019) and a Supercars Championship Media Award winner in 2019.

Tom moved back to his native UK in 2020, firstly working in BTCC, before joining Autosport and motorsport.com in 2021.