Up-and-coming rally star Max Vatanen has continued his non-stop run of podiums, which began with victory in Rallye Monte Carlo in January and continued with a win in the first round of the Drive DMACK Fiesta championship in Portugal. Last weekend he finished in third place on asphalt in Germany: an excellent result as this is not the young Finn’s favoured surface.

He struck a perfect balance between speed and consistency to come away with second place in the Drive DMACK Fiesta championship, just five points behind the leader, heading into the final two rounds of the championship. These will take place on the Catalunya Rally at the end of October, and the winner will receive a prize drive on next year’s WRC2 championship: the stepping-stone to the main World Rally Championship.

Max knew that he needed a strong finish in Germany, so he came into the tricky Trier-based event (which was originally formed from three events rolled into one) determined to make steady progress.

As a result of this sensible approach he made his way consistently up the leaderboard from start to finish, steering clear of trouble on an event that was characterised by some big problems for other drivers. Unusually, Germany’s round of the World Rally Championship was hot over all three days, increasing the physical demands on the drivers.

“It was so challenging because the grip was changing all the time,” said Max. “In fact, on the second day of the rally I was caught out on what was probably the most difficult stage of the entire event: Panzerplatte. We suddenly came to a place where the surface changed and slid wide, which damaged a door. Luckily it was easy to fix and the damage was just cosmetic, but it reminds you of just how easy it is to make a mistake here. It’s one of the toughest rallies out there.”

Despite this small indiscretion, Max already achieved his objective by climbing to third by the end of day two. He gradually built up confidence over the whole course of the event, and just missed out on a fastest stage time on the final day.

“We learned a lot and made plenty of progress, which will be especially useful on the decisive next round in Spain, as it has two days on asphalt as well as one day on gravel,” concluded Max. “We’re in a position where we have a chance of the championship now, but we’ll need to perform strongly on asphalt as well in order to take it. By the last day in Germany, we had a nice feeling with these roads. Towards the start of the rally I was maybe a little bit too cautious, but it was very important to get to the end and be sure of scoring valuable points.”

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