Hyundai brings WRC engine upgrade to Rally Portugal

Hyundai has brought an upgraded engine to Rally Portugal in a bid to close the gap and take the fight to World Rally Championship rivals Toyota.

The Korean marque has struggled to extract pace consistently from its i20 N Rally1 car, while Toyota has seemingly taken a step forward, having won all five rounds of the season to date.

Hyundai has been working on upgrades to widen its WRC car’s narrow operating window with the first wave of developments centred around the dampers, geometry and how the differentials interact on the car, arriving in Croatia last month. These are all items that do not require the use of an homologation joker.

Ahead of Rally Portugal, the team has confirmed it has spent its final engine homologation on a change that should offer a small performance upgrade. According to sporting director Andrew Wheatley the change should recoup a loss of power incurred from a recent change in fuel specification. 

“There has been a small change [to the engine]. The intake system has been modified to give a little bit more power, and again that is part of the development going on through the course of the year. It is not a revolutionary change but it is incremental and potentially it could be a positive benefit this weekend,” Wheatley told Motorsport.

“We lost a little bit of power with the fuel [change] and now we have started to recoup a bit back, but it is an advantage in allowing the engine to breathe a bit better.  

“It is not easy to get any significant performance improvement from the engine because the regulations are so tight.

“All of the homologated upgrades are here and there is a little step we can do on the non-homologated items, which will come a bit later in the year. The focus was always on Portugal and towards the end of the year.”

Hyundai drivers expect to be in the fight

After being comprehensively beaten by Toyota on asphalt in the Canary Islands last month, Hyundai had always expected to be stronger on gravel.

In Wednesday’s shakedown, it filled two of the top four positions, with Thierry Neuville topping the times by 0.3s from Toyota’s Sami Pajari. Adrien Fourmaux was 0.5s slower in third in the sister i20 N, while team-mate Dani Sordo was 1.4s slower than Neuville.

Neuville remains realistic about his expectations, with the shakedown stage unrepresentative of the stages to come and rain showers predicted on Saturday and Sunday. 

However, the 2024 world champion says this is the first rally where he should be able to fight at the front. 

“It is always a nice way to start [topping shakedown] but it is not giving any information for what the rally will be like, so we will have to see. We have done some work on the car and we have improved a bit,” Neuville told Motorsport.

Thierry Neuville, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1

Photo by: Hyundai

“It is always good news if there is an [engine] upgrade. It will not change the whole car, but it is an upgrade. It is a very small upgrade.

“Generally I’m very motivated and I want to fight at the front but I also have to be realistic. As long as the feeling is not good I really struggle with this car, even on gravel. 

“We will be closer and it will be the first rally where we are actually in the fight. I think overall road conditions will not really help us here this weekend, but it will not penalise us either. I think the fight is on. The weather will be critical and demanding and it might turn the leaderboard around, and hopefully it plays in our favour. 

“The difficulty this year is they have mixed the sandy stages with the more abrasive stages so you have a mix of surface. This makes it more challenging also for tyre choice and tyre wear. We only have 16 softs, and not knowing how the stage conditions will be makes it difficult.”

After being involved in the fight for the victory in Portugal last year before suffering a technical issue, Fourmaux is perhaps the most optimistic in the Hyundai camp. 

“It is exciting. I knew we had the potential to fight on gravel as we were fast here last year. I’m confident and we have had a very good test with the car at our test base and also on the pre-event test. I didn’t change the set-up in shakedown, and it worked, so I’m quite pleased with our preparation,” Fourmaux told Motorsport.

Adrien Fourmaux, Hyundai Shell Mobis World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1

Photo by: Hyundai

“There is the engine, suspension, and few things [improvements on the car]. As a driver you always want more power, especially when we have lost power through things like losing the hybrid system, a smaller turbo restrictor, and we have changed the fuel and every time it [the power] is going down. It feels good.”

Sordo, a seven-time podium finisher in Portugal, added: “I’m close to my team-mates and I’m happy to see that there were two Hyundais at the top of shakedown because I think the team deserves it and the driver deserve it because everybody has worked hard to improve the car. It will be nice for the team to have a nice result here.

“Already in shakedown it was close, and OK, this is not the stage we will see in the rally, but it will be close.”

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– The Motorsport.com Team

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