Why Ogier's WRC swansong was a season to savour

He’s shuffling into semi-rally-retirement, but Toyota star Sebastien Ogier was at the peak of his powers in the final season for the high downforce era-World Rally Championship cars. Despite Toyota's domination, there was still much to enjoy as the old master emerged atop a fierce title fight against team-mate Elfyn Evans

Tom Howard Dec 19, 2021, 10:30 AM

Upd: Dec 20, 2021, 10:47 PM

Sebastien Ogier underlined his place in World Rally Championship history with his eighth world title in his final full-time campaign, while the breathtaking generation of WRC machinery, introduced in 2017 and the most spectacular cars since the Group B era, delivered a memorable last blast through the world’s toughest stages.

These perhaps seminal WRC moments played out fittingly across a greatest-hits 12-round calendar, including long-awaited returns to the iconic Safari and Acropolis rallies, as normality threatened to return after last year’s COVID-induced shortened season. Add to that a titanic title fight between Toyota team-mates Ogier and Elfyn Evans that went down to the wire (including two of the closest battles in history), a crop of young stars making their mark, and plenty of drama in between – 2021 was a season to cherish.

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Author Tom Howard

Tom Howard is a News Editor working across both Autosport.com and Motorsport.com websites. Starting out as a sports reporter in local newspapers, Tom focussed on motorsport covering several national championships in the UK, including the BTCC.

After a period working as a freelance journalist, Tom moved to Australia in 2013 landing a job at leading Australian motorsport news outlet speedcafe.com, covering international motorsport events including F1, WRC and Supercars. Progressing to Editor in 2017, Tom was named Motorsport Australia Journalist of the Year for his work. He is also a two-time winner of Supercars Journalist of The Year (2017,2019) and a Supercars Championship Media Award winner in 2019.

Tom moved back to his native UK in 2020, firstly working in BTCC, before joining Autosport and motorsport.com in 2021.