Opinion: a new rally star is rising from Finland
Sami Pajari, 19, looks set to join the long list of Finnish rallying talents
I first met Sami Pajari on the 2019 Rally Finland, his World Rally Championship debut. Specifically, the Junior WRC, in a one-off ppearance for winning the Future Star competition run by Finland’s renowned AKK motorsport federation.
Pajari was gangly to the point that his overalls hung off him like a wing suit, with buck teeth and an endearing smile that was impossible to wipe off. His English was extremely limited, but enough for him to make his intentions clear.
He was straight into the top six in his class, despite never having competed at that level before, and set two fastest stage times – one of them by more than 10 seconds. He later retired in one of those barrel-rolling accidents that could only happen in Finland. But he was still smiling, even after a quick trip to hospital.
As one seasoned Finnish observer put it, this sort of speed was reminiscent of the young Juha Kankkunen. Pajari doesn’t come from a privileged background (hence the badly fitting overalls) and was studying to become an electrician. Now that plan has happily been shelved, because two years later he has just become the youngest-everJunior WRC champion at the age of 19, inheriting the mantle of legends like Sébastien Loeb and Sébastien Ogier.
He also has overalls that fit him now, muscles underneath them and a more fluent command of English. This is the evolution of the species when it comes to rally driving. However, Pajari doesn’t see himself as anything too special. “Already there are drivers like Kalle Rovanperä and Oliver Solberg who aren’t much older than me, so it’s not a big deal,” he says.
Pajari is actually only a year or two behind them. Next season, he will step up either to the factory-backed WRC2 category (perhaps with the help of M-Sport Ford, which is looking for its next front runner in the class, following works driver Adrien Fourmaux) or WRC3 as a privateer – thanks to the prize of a Rally2-spec Ford Fiesta, five free WRC2entries and 200 free tyres.
If Pajari does a good job there, we will probably see him with a few selected World Rally Car outings in 2023 (at the age of 21), which could be enough for a full-time ride in 2024 at the age of 22. By then, top-tier rallying’s new hybrid era will have hit its stride, so maybe all his knowledge of plugs and wiring l come in handy, after all.
-How it works: Mercedes' clever F1 suspension-
For a time, Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner speculated that Mercedes-AMG had achieved its recent straight-line speed advantage through engine development. But attention has now turned to the team’s rear suspension, which in Turkey was seen to compress in a sudden “nonlinear” fashion on the straights. The process reduces the car’s ride height and stalls its rear diffuser, reducing drag at speed, before the suspension pops back up for the corners.
So is the suspension serving an aerodynamic purpose and could therefore be deemed illegal? Yes, to the first bit, but apparently no to the second. That’s because the benefit is created through clever linkage geometry, not airflow. The compression works in harmony with Mercedes’ low-rake car design philosophy and might not be suited tothe high-rake Red Bull. Nevertheless, even Horner hasn’t complained too much about this one – for now.
-Motorsport greats: Roland Ratzenberger-
In between Johnny Herbert and Eddie Irvine winning the Formula Ford Festival, Roland Ratzenberger pinned his name to the motorsport map with victory in 1986. His career didn’t take off from there, as he struggled through British Formula 3 and even tried his hand at the British Touring Car Championship, before heading east to find fame and fortune on the burgeoning Japanese scene. Extremely popular among his fellow drivers, the Austrian built a career in Formula 3000 and sports cars, returning to Europe each June to race at Le Mans – before landing a surprise Formula 1 chance in 1994 with the new Simtek team. Tragically, damage to his front wing pitched him off at a high-speed bend in qualifying at Imola and he became the first fatality at a grand prix weekend in 12 years. A day later, Ayrton Senna became the second.