How Estonia crowned Pajari as the WRC’s new flying Finn

“We knew it was coming, there was no doubt, but now we have done it.”

It had indeed been coming. But few would have predicted the dominant drive Sami Pajari unleashed to claim a stunning maiden World Rally Championship win at Rally Estonia.

Make no mistake, those are not cocky words from Pajari that were uttered in jubilation after realising a dream he held ever since he was four years old mesmerised by the sight and sound of rally cars powering through the Finnish forests. The statistics clearly show that the 24-year-old has been knocking on the door of the WRC winners' club. Heading to Estonia, Pajari had already racked up five podiums this year which could only be matched by championship leader Elfyn Evans. In Croatia a second-place finish should have been a first win as an unfortunate puncture put him out of the lead. It was a warning sign to rivals that Pajari is the real deal this year.

Maybe we should have seen it coming after he lit up the times in the shakedown at the start of the weekend.

When asked by Autosport if a chance for a win was on, he said: “I really hope so. It is never going to be easy. The road position is decent, it is not the best and not the worst. I hope we can carry on with the same feeling we had in shakedown. I hope for the best and I feel it can be possible."     

Perhaps the only surprise in Estonia was the utter dominance that Pajari and co-driver Marko Salminen exercised to tame fast gravel roads that required the utmost respect, bravery and commitment. Leading from start to finish and winning 12 of 18 stages in the process says it all. From the outside it looked like total domination, but that’s not how Pajari saw it.

“I'm maybe a little bit surprised [by the dominance]. We were almost always like half a step in front of the others. It was still not really so dominant for me,” he said. “After Sunday’s first stage, I was starting to understand more or realise that the win can be possible, but still if you do one bad stage you can lose easily 10 seconds, and then the gap is already only half of what you have had. So, you need to be all the time really, really on it. Even though we won 12 stages out of 18 it never really helped me much to relax more the pressure was always there.”

Pajari had been on the cusp of a maiden WRC for some time - and delivered in style in Estonia

Photo by: Toyota Racing

A clean sweep of seven stage wins on Friday set up the foundation for the victory. Pajari, starting fourth in the order at a rally where road position is crucial, opened up a 14.7s lead over team-mate Oliver Solberg, who knows a thing or two about dominating Estonia’s roads after creating his own headlines by clinching a stunning maiden WRC win 12 months ago. 

In truth, Solberg was the only driver able to just about hang onto Pajari’s rear wing, although the Swede didn’t have the same feeling in his GR Yaris as last year to push and catch the Finn. That being said, Solberg ended Pajari’s streak of stage wins and took a nibble out of deficit on Saturday morning before the latter “stepped it up a bit” to blow away Solberg, taking the win by 19.5s. Pajari is the second driver this year to claim a maiden win following in the footsteps of team-mate Takamoto Katsuta. 

Pajari was simply unstoppable and unflappable amid the pressure of trying to break his WRC duck. The cool and calm demeanour in the car was hugely impressive while he reeled off stage win after stage win that from the outside looked effortless.

How did Pajari do it? 

In the wake of the win, Toyota deputy team principal Juha Kankkunen revealed that Pajari’s car was untouched ever since he jumped in it for shakedown. Pajari was happy with the feeling and the rest is, as they say, is history.

"There was a cool fan on the road section with a sign saying: "Sami, don't listen to [co-driver] Marko, just send it!" I'm trying to follow that" Sami Pajari

"It was a perfect weekend. He was just very calm and concentrated from the first stage to the last one. He didn’t complain about tyres, he didn’t complain about the car, nothing. He just drove in a very relaxed way. It is not easy. I knew that he is good but I have been impressed,” said Kankkunen.

Pajari had tapped into that special ‘flow zone’ feeling inside the car that drivers crave, where stage times become effortless. While it alluded him last weekend, Solberg knows this feeling all too well, as last year proved. Two-time world champion Kalle Rovanpera, who made brief return as spectator to a WRC event last weekend, has also found this nirvana behind the wheel when he too claimed his first triumph in Estonia back in 2021.

“I think it is a bit like what I felt last year,” said Solberg. “When you feel it, it is almost easy and you just keep driving. He [Sami] said all weekend that he was incredibly comfortable. He did an amazing weekend.”

Solberg, who took his maiden WRC win in Estonia last year, challenged Pajari but ultimately couldn't get near him

Photo by: Toyota Racing

Driving fast and winning stages is one, but dealing with the pressure of being on the cusp of scoring maiden WRC win is another. Pajari has many attributes but the ability to focus on the task at hand, block out any noise, nerves or pressure has to be his ultimate strength. It is something that he has built upon through his career after winning the 2021 Junior WRC crown followed by the WRC2 title in 2024.

“It's something I have gone through already a couple times in my career,” he said when asked how he kept his cool under pressure. “It has happened in WRC2 and the Junior WRC before that we've been leading the championships and it's the final round and you need to make sure you finish and so on. So it's now just a different car, but it's still the same situation. 

“At least now it went really smoothly and really well, but that has been quite a strong point for me that normally I'm not doing more mistakes under the pressure.”

When asked how he copes with the pressure, Salminen added: “I think we are just both calm people and we don’t show so many emotions. For us there is of course some excitement in the car but it is nothing crazy. We don’t care [about nerves or noise] we just focus on what we do, that is enough.”

This may seem like a robotic approach but Pajari’s trademark dry sense of humour quickly returned at stage ends. When asked about his day after stage 16, he said: “Not so straightforward. But there was a cool fan on the road section with a sign saying: "Sami, don't listen to [co-driver] Marko, just send it!" I'm trying to follow that.”

What’s next for Pajari?   

The victory is perhaps even more  when eye-catching contrasted against this time last year. Hampered by a power issue, Pajari finished a distant seventh while Solberg waltzed into the team for what was then a one-off drive and took a sensational win. At the time some began to question Pajari’s position, which in hindsight seems incredibly foolish now after last weekend’s triumph.

The Finn blocked out the noise having come under pressure at Toyota

Photo by: Toyota Racing

Pajari dealt with the noise that Solberg's win created in his stride and remained cool and calm, just like he was behind the wheel last weekend.      

When asked in an Autosport interview earlier this year if Solberg’s Estonia triumph and the noise it created affected him, he said: “I think maybe not so much that people would expect. Maybe it was just creating some hassle. Everyone was suddenly saying, is it me or Taka [Katsuta] or someone will lose the seat because Oliver was so, so good. But for me personally, there was not really this kind of discussion.”

Ultimately this victory is the latest chapter of Pajari’s step-by-step approach that he has taken throughout his climb up the rally ladder from Junior WRC to rallying’s elite.

They say you must learn to walk before you can run, which Pajari’s increasingly glittering career resume shows. Junior WRC title. Check. WRC2 title. Check. Adjust to Rally1 car. Check. First WRC podium. Check. First WRC win. Check. The steps are being ticked off.

"We have shown is that we are ready for the fight and can win if it goes our way" Sami Pajari

Now sitting third in the championship, 33 points adrift of leader Evans and with the most podiums (six) of any driver this year, does he now consider himself ready to take the next step and be a title contender? “I think so, and maybe it's the moment that also someone else is starting to recognise it [that I’m a title contender],” said Pajari. “I cannot really think too much about it. I just try to do the best job I can, and that's exactly what we have done this season.”

Next up is just the small matter of Rally Finland where Pajari can now expect a hero’s welcome as the rally-mad nation’s latest WRC winner.  

“It is the best possible preparation for Rally Finland to have such a great result in Estonia," he said. "The rallies are not exactly the same and some of the bits are quite similar and you need to have self-confidence to go flat out. It is promising of course but still we cannot underestimate the competition so it is not going to be any easier. But we have shown is that we are ready for the fight and can win if it goes our way.”

Can Pajari launch a full title attack after his first win?

Photo by: Hyundai