Can Hyundai get back in the WRC title frame on rough Acropolis Rally Greece?

Hyundai Motorsport heads to this week’s Acropolis Rally Greece aiming to turn the FIA World Rally Championship’s gravel-heavy second half into a title fightback for the Korean marque.

Round eight of the 2026 WRC season marks a significant shift in the campaign. After a first half that was split across snow, asphalt, gravel and mixed conditions, the championship now begins a run of seven consecutive all-gravel rallies to the finish – starting with one of the toughest of them all.

Greece has been kind to Hyundai (above, 2025) in recent years. It’s won three of the last four Acropolis Rallies, with Thierry Neuville triumphing in 2022 and ’24 – the latter a springboard to his first WRC title – and the now-retired Ott Tanak adding victory last season. Hyundai also swept the podium in 2022 and ’24, making the rough Greek gravel roads one of the team’s most prolific hunting grounds.

Should Hyundai carry on its previous Acropolis form, the timing couldn’t be better. Toyota Gazoo Racing has controlled much of the opening half of the season, winning last time out at Rally Japan with Elfyn Evans and currently filling the top five positions in the WRC drivers’ standings through Evans, Takamoto Katsuta, Oliver Solberg, Sami Pajari and Sebastien Ogier.

Evans leads by 20 points from Katsuta after his Japan victory, but as first car on the road in Greece, he’ll be clearing loose gravel for the cars behind, and the Welshman is expecting a demanding start to the Acropolis.

“To win Rally Japan again was amazing and it rounded off what’s been quite a good first half of the year for us,” said the GR Yaris Rally1 driver. “But we know that the second half can be tough with every rally being on gravel, so everything is still very open in the championship.

“Greece can be one of the more difficult rallies to open the road, particularly with most of the Friday stages being run only once. But we’ve got some good experience now of being in this position, and we’ve been working hard together with the team to try and improve the feeling and the pace for those conditions.”

Gravel events such as Portugal (above) have given Toyota’s Elfyn Evans the road-opening experience he’ll definitely need on the Acropolis.

For Neuville, the return to gravel brings renewed optimism. The Belgian sits seventh in points after a difficult run of asphalt events in his Hyundai i20 N Rally1, but he arrives in Greece with a favorable starting position and two Acropolis wins on his record.

“We have a good starting order heading into a run of gravel events, where we know we can be competitive,” said the 2024 champ. “That gives me a real boost of motivation, knowing we’re heading into a rally where we should perform well.

“Our goal is clear – we’re going for victory. With our starting order, a competitive car and a rally where we have always performed well, that is absolutely our target.”

His Hyundai teammate Adrien Fourmaux is also looking to use Greece as the start of a stronger run. The Frenchman finished on the Acropolis podium last year and is Hyundai’s highest-placed driver in the standings, sixth and just one point behind Ogier.

“It’s been quite a tough first half of the season due to the amount of [asphalt] events, where we struggled a bit more,” Fourmaux said. “But we are in a good position to be very competitive for the rest of the season.

“Our target for the second half of the season is to get some victories to be back on track for the championship fight.”

With the WRC’s asphalt events now behind him, Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux is targeting wins in an all-gravel second half of the season.

Dani Sordo completes Hyundai’s lineup in the third factory i20 N Rally1, the part-timer returning for one of his strongest events. The Spaniard has stood on the Acropolis podium in four of his last five starts and finished second in 2024 after leading before a puncture on the Aghii Theodori stage.

Toyota, however, arrives with momentum and depth. Evans is joined in a five-Yaris attack by Katsuta, Solberg, Pajari and Ogier, with the team chasing more points after its home 1-2-3-4 finish in Japan. Nine-time and reigning WRC champ Ogier is a former Acropolis winner, having claimed victory in 2011, while Solberg returns to Greece after winning in the second-tier WRC2 class last year and finishing sixth overall.

M-Sport Ford runs four Puma Rally1 cars, with full-season drivers Jon Armstrong and Josh McErlean joined by rapid Latvian Martins Sesks and gentleman driver Jourdan Serderidis. On an event where road position and reliability can play a huge role in bringing a decent result, the British-based squad will hope to take advantage of any Greek drama for Toyota and Hyundai.

In WRC2, the championship lead could change hands this week as one of the season’s deepest fields of Rally2-spec cars prepares for a punishing few days.

Thirty WRC2 crews are entered, with several title contenders choosing the Acropolis as one of their seven points-scoring events.

Nikolay Gryazin sits at the top of the standings after his Rally Japan class victory, but the Lancia Ypsilon YF Rally2 driver isn’t entered in Greece. That leaves a major opportunity for the chasing pack, with his teammate, Yohan Rossel, Roope Korhonen and Leo Rossel all just four points behind, and Alejandro Cachon only 10 points from the lead.

Yohan Rossel heads the entry in his Lancia, aiming to turn his strong first half of the season into the championship lead. The Frenchman has already shown his ability to manage technical rallies and begins Greece as one of the drivers best placed to capitalize on Gryazin’s absence.

Lancia’s Yohan Rossel will be aiming for a first win on gravel in the Ypsilon YF and with it the WRC2 points lead.

His brother, Leo Rossel, also starts level on 52 points and is entered with co-driver Guillaume Mercoiret in a 2C Junior Team Lancia, switching from his usual Citroen C3. The pair have been among the benchmark crews throughout the opening half of the year and now face a very different challenge from the asphalt and mixed-surface events that shaped the early season.

Korhonen is the third driver tied on 52 points. The Finn and co-driver Anssi Viinikka bring their Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 to Greece with the chance to move into the lead of the championship.

American duo Conner Martell and his experienced co-driver Alex Gelsomino make their first Acropolis appearance in a second Lancia for 2C Junior Team. The outing marks the first of three planned WRC appearances this season, with Rally Finland and Rally Italy Sardinia also included in his program.

Martell, a 29-year-old Vermont native, built his career across rallycross and stage rallying in the United States before expanding his program into Europe with 2C Competition.

His preparations have included appearances in the French Gravel Rally Championship alongside Gelsomino, following a second-place overall finish on his European debut at Rallye Terre de Vaucluse last season.

“I’m super excited to be heading to the WRC,” said Martell. “It’s always been a dream of mine and I never thought I’d get the chance to compete over in Europe, especially in the WRC.

“To be with a team like Lancia, with its history, and to have 2C running the team is incredible. It’s less of a big change for me to stay with 2C because we work really well together, so I think we’ll be able to do well with the car and hopefully have some good results.

“I definitely don’t know what to expect or where we should be looking as far as position, but I’m just excited for the challenge and to see where we stand against some of the best in the world.

“It’s also pretty incredible to be one of only three American drivers to compete at this level in the WRC in the past 25 years.”

This year’s Acropolis has a new look. Rally headquarters move from Lamia to Loutraki, the seaside resort on the Gulf of Corinth, while the route spans Attica, the Peloponnese and Central Greece. Crews face 17 stages and 201 competitive miles, with 75 percent of the route new for 2026 and only Stiri carried over unchanged from last year.

The rally begins on Thursday with shakedown near Loutraki before the opening Super Special Stage at The Ellinikon Sports Park in Athens. A ferry transfer then takes cars and crews from Corinth to Itea ahead of Friday’s longest leg, which includes Bauxites, Parnassos Mt., two passes of Stiri, Elikon Mt. and Thiva in its 80.3 stage miles.

Saturday moves the action to the Peloponnese, taking in Ghymno, Kolines, Menalo Mt. and Kefalari, before Sunday’s final leg pairing two runs through Aghii Theodori with two passes of Loutraki. The second pass of Loutraki will form the rally-closing, bonus points-paying Wolf Power Stage.

Catch WRC action from all rounds of the 2026 FIA World Rally Championship on RACER Network and the RACER+ App. Tune in on Monday, June 29 at 9.00pm ET for full highlights from Acropolis Rally Greece.

RACER Network is also your home for the WRC Magazine show, with new episodes landing on the Thursday before every WRC event. You can get up to speed for the rough gravel and searing heat of Acropolis Rally Greece on Thursday, June 25 at 10:30pm ET.

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