The third World Championship start of the season brought Lauri Joona a third place

Lauri Joona and Janni Hussi were responsible for the best Finnish position in the World Rally Championship in Portugal, which ended today. The third WC rally of the season brought the duo third place in the tough WRC2 class. The beginning of the World Cup rally in Portugal was certainly not according to Lauri Joona's script. After the public special test on the asphalt on Thursday evening, Joona's name was found in the results of the WRC2 class in 24th place.

- Definitely not a quick bet when you had to save tires for Friday. But let's at least give the audience entertainment, laughed Joona after the asphalt spin.

The continuation then went much better. The Portuguese World Rally was a really surprising race, when drivers fell from the top of the WRC2 class one after the other due to both technical problems and driving mistakes. This, and my own steady and problem-free performance, boosted Joona and Janni Huss' shares skyrocketing. At the end of Saturday evening, the ranking was already fourth in the class.

- We got really good special test times, and we were closer to the top of the class in terms of time. Everything worked well and the technology didn't cause any problems either. Amarante experienced a flat tire on the second pull, but that's part of the story and fortunately not much time was lost, Joona summed up during the evening maintenance on Saturday.

In Sunday's first special test, Joona, competing in a Skoda Fabia RS Rally2 car, attacked and drove his best ek ranking of the race. When at the same time the nearest competitor had a one-minute time penalty and the driving was not fast either, Joona was already on the bottom podium of the podium in the results. And that third place lasted until the very end. At the finish of the legendary Fafe, we saw a really happy driver.

- Really good feeling! A long race that was finished in the best possible way. First podium finish in the WRC2 class, yes this is like a victory for us. A big thank you to the TGS Motorsport team and everyone who has been supporting us.

Spain's Jan Solans won the WRC2 class and took second place

supported by Ireland's Josh McErlean . Joona was also third in the WRC2 Challenger series. The fastest Rally2 driver at the Portuguese World Rally Championship was Nikolay Gryazin , competing under the Bulgarian flag, but he did not score any WRC2 points.

Lauri Joona and Janni Huss's next race is the World Rally Championship in Sardinia in May-June. Portugal World Rally Championship, 9-12 May 2024

Results and points tables: https://www.wrc.com/en/wrcplus/live-timing/

More information: Lauri Joona, 044 513 4251, lauri.joona@hotmail.fi Mikko Dahlman, 040 738 3080,mikko.dahlman@kopterstein.com