Toyota GAZOO Racing eyes sixth straight WRC manufacturers’ title at Rally del Paraguay

TOYOTA GAZOO Racing World Rally Team is heading into the Rally del Paraguay with its manufacturers’ championship title within reach, treating the Aug. 27-30 event as the first chance in a two-rally South American stretch to lock in a sixth consecutive crown. The team’s position at the top of the standings is built on recent momentum on high-speed asphalt and gravel-style challenges earlier in the season. After strong results on the most recent events in Estonia and Finland, TGR-WRT extended its lead of the manufacturers’ championship to 174 points. Toyota’s target for Paraguay is specific: the team believes it can clinch the title if it increases its advantage by at least six more points on the weekend’s results.

TGR-WRT’s driver line-up also remains tightly placed in the overall championship picture. Elfyn Evans continues to lead the drivers’ standings with an increased advantage of 30 points. Sami Pajari, who recorded his first two WRC victories back-to-back in Estonia and Finland, is now Evans’ nearest challenger, narrowing the gap but still chasing from behind. Behind them, Takamoto Katsuta and Oliver Solberg are still in contention for the championship’s upper tier. Katsuta is listed 41 points from the lead and Solberg is 45 points back, leaving the team with multiple ways to score strongly even if the title fight shifts toward the manufacturers’ race.

A notable storyline for Paraguay is the team’s return to action with Sébastien Ogier and his regular co-driver Vincent Landais. Ogier is described as 62 points behind the championship leader following an accident in Finland, ending his run short of the ideal path through that event. In Paraguay, however, the team says he is ready to return with Landais, and it also highlights that Ogier and Landais won the country’s inaugural WRC event in 2025. TOYOTA GAZOO Racing also continues to broaden its development pipeline through its WRC Challenge Program, which fields young drivers in the WRC2 class. The team’s WRC Challenge Program driver Yuki Yamamoto is making his first rallies in South America, and Toyota frames the opening of this chapter around adaptation to unfamiliar conditions rather than a headline goal for immediate results.

Beyond Toyota’s WRC effort, the event itself will feature a deep WRC2 field on the GR Yaris Rally2. Toyota notes that the GR Yaris Rally2 is the most popular car in the Paraguay entry list, with 12 cars entered in total. Other regular WRC2 competitors are listed as Alejandro Cachón and Gus Greensmith, along with nine Paraguayan drivers including Diego Domínguez, Andrea Lafarja, Alejandro Galanti, Gustavo Saba, Fabrizio Galanti, Augusto Bestard, Franco Pappalardo, and Miguel María García. A returning presence is also expected from Bolivia, where Marco Bulacia is set to take part on his home continent. Toyota’s preview positions Paraguay’s mix of local participation and international entries as a big part of what makes the event attractive, both for drivers and for fans.

Toyota’s preview stresses that Paraguay’s road surface is not just a scenic backdrop but a competitive variable. The fast roads run on a red clay surface that can change grip levels, and the team says significant bumps and sharp rocks can test cars and tyres. Encarnación, the event base on the banks of the Paraná River and near the border with Argentina, is expected to set up a weekend where tyre management and traction can matter as much as outright speed. The team also points to how weather can reshuffle the balance. Evans, returning after his first Paraguay experience last year, described how polished clay and changing grip levels made the event harder than the stages appeared on paper. He said that rain on the final morning left drivers with very little grip, and he noted that running first on the road can turn a drizzle from “help” into a “lottery” when grip levels become extremely low.

The event format, according to Toyota’s preview, begins with a ceremonial start in Encarnación on Thursday evening. Competition then opens on Friday with the longest day of racing, made up of two loops of four stages totalling 153.78 competitive kilometres. Saturday follows with two more loops of four tests, plus a new super special stage in Encarnación. Sunday closes with five stages. Toyota’s executives and drivers view the weekend through both a title-lens and a development-lens. Juha Kankkunen, deputy team principal, said the opportunity to secure the manufacturers’ title in Paraguay is real but not easy, citing what the team learned during its first visit last year. Ogier framed the return around health and race rhythm after his Finland accident, while also saying the team wants to target top results in remaining rallies to support Toyota’s overall campaign.

There are limits to what Toyota has disclosed beyond performance and preparation. The preview does not provide specific setup choices, tyre strategies, or expected performance gaps relative to rivals, and it does not spell out what exact combinations of results across the scoring system would guarantee the manufacturers’ title in every scenario. The “at least six more points” threshold is presented as the team’s practical target, but the precise path to clinching can depend on how points are distributed among cars in each stage and on other teams’ finishing positions. Even with that caveat, the story lines are clear. With a 174-point manufacturers’ lead and a driver group anchored by Evans’ advantage and supported by Pajari, Katsuta, Solberg, and Ogier’s return, TGR-WRT heads to Paraguay for an event Toyota describes as both passionate and demanding, on a surface that can punish misjudgments quickly.

In the next two weeks, Paraguay will also serve as a gateway to Rally Chile, because Toyota’s preview describes the trip as the first of two consecutive South American gravel challenges. For fans, the key watchpoints are whether Toyota can extend its manufacturers’ advantage by the needed margin and how the event’s clay-and-weather dynamics affect the early running order. For rivals, the immediate question will be whether they can turn grip variability into a consistent scoring edge rather than a one-off boost. For Toyota, the immediate focus is finishing strong enough in round 11 to keep the title conversation from slipping into later rounds.