Teemu Suninen who became the WRC2 class winner in Secto Rally Finland was disqualified on Sunday evening after the front bumper on his Hyundai i20 N Rally2 was found to be underweighted during the scrutineering which resulted in Toksport WRT´s Emil Lindholm is handed the win.
Suninen who had bad luck over the season in the WRC2 class had it all settled for a first win of the season on the home rally but once again the win got taken away this time by a simple human error, last time it happened he was on route for a win but he crashed on the final stage of Rally Portugal and handed the win to Yohan Rossel.
The stewards’ decision said that in the scrutineering the weight of the front bumper was measured at 3,931g which is below the minimum allowed weight of 4,510g required to comply with homologation and Suninen’s team manager Pablo Marcos and Andrea Cisotti who is the manager at Hyundai Customer Racing agreed the part was underweight as the front bumper was not an original part produced by the team.
Credit: @World / Red Bull Content Pool
The copied part was fitted on to Suninen´s car by the Red Grey team as a human error, the team are also running the WRC2 outfit for the South Korean manufacturer.
This means the disqualification resulted in Lindholm being promoted to rally win, he finished before the steward decision in second place with 7.7 seconds behind Suninen, Estonian´s Egon Kaur was moved up to second place while WRC returneer Hayden Paddon ends with a third place.
Official rally results for WRC2:
Pos. | Number | Driver / Co-driver | Country | Team | Model |
1. | #20 | Emil Lindholm / Reeta Hämäläinen | Finland | Toksport WRT 2 | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
2. | #22 | Egon Kaur / Silver Simm | Estonia | M Rautio OY | Volkswagen Polo GTI R5 |
3. | #25 | Hayden Paddon / John Kennard | New Zealand | Hyundai New Zealand | Hyundai i20 N Rally2 |
4. | #23 | Teemu Asunmaa / Ville Mannisenmäki | Finland | TGS | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
5. | #28 | Eerik Pietarinen / Antti Linnaketo | Finland | Printsport | Volkswagen Polo GTI R5 |
6. | #29 | Mikolaj Marczyk / Szymon Gospodarczyk | Poland | Orlen Team | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
7. | #34 | Fabrizio Zaldivar / Marcelo Der Ohannesian | Paraguay / Argentina | Hyundai Motorsport N | Hyundai i20 N Rally2 |
8. | #31 | Martin Prokop / Michal Ernst | Czech Republic | MP Sports | Ford Fiesta Rally2 |
9. | #37 | Freddy Loix / Pieter Tsjoen | Belgium | Pieter Tsjoen Racing | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
10. | #27 | Sami Pajari / Enni Mälkönen | Finland | Toksport WRT | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
11. | #50 | Thierry Colney / Florian Zingle | France | Eric Mauffrey | Skoda Fabia R5 |
12. | #46 | Kees Burger / Teemu Arminen | Netherlands / Finland | Kees Burger | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
13. | #47 | Jari Tuuri / Arto Kapanen | Finland | Dynamo | Skoda Fabia R5 |
14. | #49 | Fabio Friserio / Giovanni Agnese | Italy | Munaretto | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
15. | #51 | Peter Thomson / Antti Haapala | Canada / Finland | Riku Taho Rally Consulting | Skoda Fabia R5 |
16. | #32 | Guarav Gill / Gabriel Morales | India / Brazil | Motorsport Italia | Skoda Fabia R5 |
17. | #24 | Mikko Heikkilä / Samu Vaaleri | Finland | TGS | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |
18. | #35 | Josh McErlean / James Fulton | Ireland | PCRS Rallysport | Hyundai i20 N Rally2 |
DSQ, | #21 | Teemu Suninen / Mikko Markkula | Finland | Hyundai Motorsport N | Hyundai i20 N Rally2 |
RET. | #45 | Anssi Rytkönen / Juho-Ville Koskela | Finland | SePen Ralliautoilu ja Elämys Oy | Skoda Fabia R5 |
RET. | #48 | Enda McCormack / Liam McCormack | Ireland / USA | PCRS Rallysport | Hyundai i20 R5 |
RET. | #36 | Riku Tahko / Sami Ryynänen | Finland | Riku Tahko Rally Consulting | Hyundai i20 R5 |
RET. | #26 | Nikolay Gryazin / Konstantin Aleksandrov | RAF | Toksport WRT 2 | Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo |