2021 World Rally Championship

With the addition of Rally Chile to the calendar in 2019, the FIA opened the tender process for new events to join the championship in 2020.[10] Three events were successful,[lower-alpha 3] but the championship was affected by a series of cancellations in 2019 and 2020 that necessitated changes to the 2021 calendar:

• Rally Catalunya is due to return to the championship. The rally was removed from the 2020 schedule as part of an event-sharing agreement that would see it removed from the calendar for one year, but be guaranteed a spot on the calendar for the next two.[5] The rally is set return to running exclusively on tarmac roads for the first time since 2009.[12][lower-alpha 4]
• Rally Chile is due to return after a one-year absence. The rally had been included on the original draft of the 2020 calendar, but was later cancelled in the face of ongoing civil unrest in the country. Organisers of the event negotiated a return to the calendar for the 2021 championship.[13]
• Rally Croatia will make its championship début, replacing Rally Mexico.[5] Croatia will become the 34th country to host a World Rally Championship round. It will be based in Zagreb, and run on tarmac roads.
• Rally Deutschland was removed from the calendar. The event had planned to run in 2020, but was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[14] It was not included on the 2021 calendar.
• The Rallies of Finland and Portugal are due to return to the championship after a one-year absence. The 2020 events were cancelled in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.[15][16]

The Ypres Rally's début will make Belgium the 35th nation to hold a World Rally Championship event.

• Rally GB was replaced by the Ypres Rally in Belgium.[9] Rally GB had originally planned to move from Wales to Northern Ireland, but the event was replaced when organisers were unable to come to an agreement with the government of Northern Ireland to support the rally.
• Rally Japan is scheduled to return to the calendar for the first time since 2010.[5] It was originally included on the 2020 calendar, but was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[17]
• The Safari Rally is scheduled to be run as a World Championship event for the first time since 2002. The event is to be based in the Kenyan capital Nairobi and feature stages around Lake Naivasha.[18] The event had been planned to make its return to the championship in 2020, but was cancelled in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.[19]

The Arctic Rally is set to become the first World Rally Championship round held inside the Arctic Circle.

• Rally Sweden was included on the first draft of the calendar with its traditional February date,[7] but was cancelled before the start of the season due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[20][8] The Arctic Rally in northern Finland was chosen as a replacement to ensure that a winter rally was included on the calendar.[21][lower-alpha 5]

In light of the disruption caused by the pandemic in 2020 and in anticipation of further delays, the calendar included an additional six reserve rounds that could be included in the event of rallies being cancelled. These events include rallies in Greece, Turkey, Argentina, Monza and Latvia.[5][23] The Ypres Rally had also been included on this reserve list before it replaced Rally GB.[9]

Esapekka Lappi (left) left the championship, allowing Adrien Fourmaux (right) to make his début with M-Sport Ford WRT.

M-Sport Ford WRT will only enter two full-time entries in 2021.[27] The first will be crewed by Gus Greensmith and Elliott Edmondson, who contested selected rallies for the team in 2019 and 2020. The second car will be shared by two crews; one made up of World Rally Championship-2 graduates Adrien Fourmaux and Renaud Jamoul, while the other will be led by Teemu Suninen, who will be partnered by Mikko Markkula. Esapekka Lappi and Janne Ferm, who drove for M-Sport in 2020, left the team.[27]

Thierry Neuville (left) parted ways with co-driver with Nicolas Gilsoul (right) before the season started.

Hyundai retained the line-up of Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja.[28] Thierry Neuville also retained with the team, but he ended his ten-year partnership with Nicolas Gilsoul.[29] Martijn Wydaeghe is set to co-drive with Neuville.[30] The team's third entry will be shared between crews led by Dani Sordo and Craig Breen.[31] Sordo will be partnered with new co-driver Borja Rozada after the Monte Carlo Rally as Carlos del Barrio is due to partner Fabrizio Zaldívar in the WRC-3 category.[32][33] Nine-time World Champion Sébastien Loeb left Hyundai to join Bahrain Raid Xtreme team in the 2021 Dakar Rally and Team X44 in the Extreme E electric rally raid series.[34][35] Hyundai's second team, Hyundai 2C Competition, will enter an i20 Coupe WRC for Pierre-Louis Loubet and Vincent Landais at every round of the championship. Loubet and Landais had previously contested three events with the team in 2020.[36]

Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT had planned to introduce a new car based on the Toyota GR Yaris,[37] an "homologation special", or road-going version of a car specifically designed for competition and with production limited to the minimum number required to meet homologation requirements.[38] However, the team later announced that it had abandoned development the GR Yaris, citing the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the automotive industry and the costs of developing the car when new regulations were due to be introduced in 2022.[39] Tommi Mäkinen stepped down from Toyota's team principal to become the company's motorsport advisor.[40] Former driver Jari-Matti Latvala was named to succeed Mäkinen's role.[41]

Reigning World Drivers' Champion Sébastien Ogier announced that he would retire from full-time competition at the end of the 2020 championship,[42] but his retirement would be delayed as he renewed a one-year deal with Toyota.[43] Ogier explained that his decision to stay in the sport was because the shortened 2020 championship was not how he wanted his career to end.[44] The team retained the pairings of Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin and of Kalle Rovanperä and Jonne Halttunen.[45] Takamoto Katsuta and Daniel Barritt remained with the team to contest a full-time campaign.[46]

Pirelli will replace Michelin as the sport's sole tyre supplier.[24] Under the terms of the agreement, Pirelli will supply tyres to all teams entering Rally1 and Rally2 cars.

2021 will see the creation of the World Rally Championship for Teams, a new championship title that will exist alongside the World Rally Championships for Drivers, Co-drivers and Manufacturers.[1] A team taking part in the Teams' championship will only be able to score points in a rally if a manufacturer competing with the same make of car has been entered into the event. Teams competing in the Teams' championship must contend a minimum of seven rallies, one of which must be outside Europe to be eligible for the championship.

As the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic meant that only seven of the thirteen events planned for the 2020 championship took place, the World Motorsport Council passed a resolution declaring that for the drivers', co-drivers' and manufacturers' championship titles to be awarded a minimum of six rallies must be held.[23]

Manufacturers will be awarded Power Stage bonus points for the first time. The scoring system will be the same as that used by drivers and co-drivers, with five points awarded for the fastest manufacturer car down to one point for the fifth quickest. Only the two fastest drivers from a single manufacturer will eligible to score.[47]

The 2021 FIA World Rally Championship went underway in Monaco. The Hyundai crew of Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja took an early lead,[48] but their lead was wiped out when they were comprised by lost of power in hairpins.[49] The Estoinan pair's rally was further hampered by two punctures, which meant that they did not have enough rubber on one of their wheels for the car to be considered road legal. Unable to complete the liasion between special stages, Tänak and Järveoja were ruled out for the second consecutive year in Monte-Carlo.[50] The M-Sport crew of Teemu Suninen and Mikko Markkula also retired from the rally when they crashed out at the very first stage of the event.[51] Local heroes Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia were the favourites for the weekend. Despite a flat tyre that lost the lead to their teammates Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin,[52] the reigning world champions set fastest stage time after fastest stage time to regain the top spot and eventually won their eighth Monte Carlo victory, a new record for wins in Monte Carlo.[53] They also became the first crew to win the rally with five different manufacturers. Evans and Martin finished second to complete a Toyota one-two. The Japanese manufacturer's party was further flourished by the dominance at the Power Stage, which saw them build a twenty-two-point lead over the reigning manufacturers' champions Hyundai.[53] Last year victor Thierry Neuville joined them on the podium with his new co-driver Martijn Wydaeghe, whose first ever podium in the championship.[53]

Points were awarded to the top ten classified finishers in each event. In the manufacturers' championship, teams were eligible to nominate three crews to score points, but these points were only awarded to the top two classified finishers representing a manufacturer and driving a 2017-specification World Rally Car. There were also five bonus points awarded to the winners of the Power Stage, four points for second place, three for third, two for fourth and one for fifth. Power Stage points were awarded in the drivers', co-drivers' championships and manufacturers'.[47][56]