Rally Finland

Rally Finland

The Neste Oil Rally Finland (formerly known as the 1000 Lakes Rally) is a rally competition held in Jyväskylä in the Finnish Lakeland in Central Finland. The rally is driven on wide and smooth gravel roads, featuring blind crests and big jumps. It is the fastest event in the World Rally Championship and has been dubbed the "Grand Prix of rallying". Rally Finland is among the largest annually organised public events in the Nordic countries, attracting hundreds of thousands of spectators each year. The rally has been known to be very difficult for non-Nordic drivers; only four drivers outside Finland and Sweden have won the event.

Rally Finland was first held under the name Jyväskylän Suurajot (Jyväskylä Grand Prix) in 1951. Originally an endurance event that stretched to Lapland in Northern Finland, the rally was at the forefront of the adoption of the modern rally format, splitting the route into a number of special stages in the mid-1950s. With increasing international attention, it became part of the European Rally Championship programme in 1959. After the start of the World Rally Championship in 1973, the event became the Finnish round in the series. Rally Finland is now among the most popular and prestigious rallies in the championship.