announced that he'd exercised an option in his deal to end his contract with Hyundai a year early. It is a bold move from the 2019 world champion and one that is set to trigger a number of potential driver line-up changes in the service park.Before assessing the make up of the 2023 field it is pertinent to understand how this situation has unfolded. Tanak's WRC future has been uncertain for a matter of months despite holding a contract for 2023 with the South Korean marque.
When the i20 N burst onto the scene in Monte Carlo it was far from a finished product. It was unreliable and struggling to match the GR Yaris and Puma counterparts. To Hyundai's credit it has managed to transform its i20 N into a winning machine, with Tanak taming the car to record victories in Sardinia, Finland and Belgium. However, a series of reliability issues have proven to be the i20 N's Achilles heel that has left Tanak frustrated.
"The rest, it's up to the management to work out how we could continue. The potential in the car is huge, they've done a great job first designing it but now to put it together it needs another good effort, but it needs a team effort, all together and that's what we are working for."Photo by: Fabien Dufour / Hyundai Motorsport
"If you are to fight for [the drivers'] championship then it was wrong and if you want to have good PR it is the right decision," he said."It depends whose perspective you are looking from. My perspective is I want to fight for the championship, but it is shame that we couldn't do it in a fair fight."
"What I like is to have Ott as my teammate because he is the strongest teammate I have ever had," said Neuville."It makes an additional challenge for me but it is also motivating as well for me."So what does the future hold for Tanak? To remain in the WRC top flight Tanak's options appear to be limited to Toyota and M-Sport. Speculation that he could rejoin M-Sport, the team that launched his WRC career in 2011, has rumbled on for several weeks. But it seems something drastic would have to change at the Ford squad in terms of funding to land Tanak, as outlined by team principal Richard Millener in New Zealand earlier this month.
here, you dropped this ..
Where Tanak is going?