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The 1990 World Rally Championship was the 18th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 12 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Carlos Sainz in a Toyota Celica GT-Four ST165, ahead of Didier Auriol and Juha Kankkunen. The manufacturers' title was won by Lancia, ahead of Toyota and Mitsubishi.
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| Black = Tarmac | Brown = Gravel | Blue = Snow/Ice | Red = Mixed Surface |
|---|---|---|---|
| Key | |
|---|---|
| Colour | Result |
| Gold | Winner |
| Silver | 2nd place |
| Bronze | 3rd place |
| Green | Points finish |
| Blue | Non-points finish |
| Non-classified finish (NC) | |
| Purple | Did not finish (Ret) |
| Black | Excluded (EX) |
| Disqualified (DSQ) | |
| White | Did not start (DNS) |
| Cancelled (C) | |
| Blank | Withdrew entry from the event (WD) |
| Pos. | Manufacturer | MON  | POR  | KEN  | COR  | GRC  | ARG  | FIN  | AUS  | SRM  | GBR  | Points | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lancia | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 137 | ||
| 2 |  Toyota | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 131 | |||
| 3 | Mitsubishi | 5 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 56 | ||||||||
| 4 | Subaru | 6 | 8 | 4 | 4 | 43 | ||||||||
| 5 | Mazda | 8 | 6 | 6 | 5 | 30 | ||||||||
| 6 | Renault | 7 | 6 | 24 | ||||||||||
| 7 |  Audi | 7 | 9 | 4 | 9 | 24 | ||||||||
| 8 | Ford | 8 | 9 | 6 | 22 | |||||||||
| 9 | BMW | 3 | 14 | |||||||||||
| 10 | Volkswagen | 5 | 10 | |||||||||||
| 11 | Citroën | 6 | 8 | |||||||||||
| 12 | Renault Argentina | 7 | 8 | |||||||||||
| 13 | Fiat Argentina | 8 | 6 | |||||||||||
| 14 | Daihatsu | 9 | 3 | |||||||||||
| 15 | Peugeot | 9 | 2 | |||||||||||
| 16 | Nissan | 10 | 2 | |||||||||||
| Pos. | Manufacturer | MON | POR | KEN | COR | GRC | ARG | FIN | AUS | SRM | GBR | Points | ||
| Sources: [2] [5] | ||||||||||||||
The World Rally Championship is an international rallying series owned and governed by the FIA. Inaugurated in 1973, it is the second oldest of the FIA's world championships after Formula One. Each season lasts one calendar year, and separate championship titles are awarded to drivers, co-drivers and manufacturers. There are also two support championships, WRC2 and WRC3, which are contested on the same events and stages as the WRC, but with progressively lower maximum performance and running costs of the cars permitted. Junior WRC is also contested on five events of the World Rally Championship calendar.
Carlos Sainz Cenamor is a Spanish rally driver. He won the World Rally Championship drivers' title with Toyota in 1990 and 1992, and finished runner-up four times. Constructors' world champions to have benefited from Sainz are Subaru (1995), Toyota (1999) and Citroën. In the 2018 season, he was one of the official drivers of the Team Peugeot Total. He received the Princess of Asturias Sports Award in 2020. Sainz founded the Acciona | Sainz XE Team to join Extreme E and competed in the first two seasons alongside Laia Sanz.
Juha Matti Pellervo Kankkunen is a Finnish former rally driver. His factory team career in the World Rally Championship lasted from 1983 to 2002. He won 23 world rallies and four drivers' world championship titles, which were both once records in the series. Both Sébastien Loeb and Sébastien Ogier have since collected more world titles, but no driver was able to repeat Kankkunen's feat of becoming a world champion with three different manufacturers until Ogier matched this achievement in 2020.
Markku Allan Alén is a Finnish former rally and race car driver. He drove for Fiat, Lancia, Subaru and Toyota in the World Rally Championship, and held the record for most stage wins (801) in the series, until Sébastien Loeb overtook it at the 2011 Rally Catalunya. Alén's phrase "now maximum attack" became well-known.
The 2004 World Rally Championship was the 32nd season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 16 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Sébastien Loeb in a Citroën Xsara WRC, ahead of Petter Solberg and Markko Märtin. The manufacturers' title was won by Citroën, ahead of Ford and Subaru.
The 2002 World Rally Championship was the 30th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 14 rallies. Marcus Grönholm won his second drivers' world championship in a Peugeot 206 WRC, ahead of Petter Solberg and Carlos Sainz. The manufacturers' title was won by Peugeot, ahead of Ford and Subaru.
The 2000 World Rally Championship was the 28th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 14 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Marcus Grönholm in a Peugeot 206 WRC, breaking the streak of Tommi Mäkinen who had won the previous 4 titles for Mitsubishi, ahead of Richard Burns and Carlos Sainz. The manufacturers' title was won by Peugeot, ahead of Ford and Subaru.
The 1976 World Rally Championship was the fourth season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). 10 events were included on the schedule, as the series revisited the same locations as the previous season. The only change in the schedule was a slight shuffle in order, with Portugal being moved up to March from July.
The 1975 World Rally Championship was the third season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). 10 events were included on the schedule, including the return to the series of the famous Monte Carlo and Swedish rallies after a one season absence of those events. Both North American events were removed from the schedule however. Other returning entries to the schedule included the Acropolis Rally in Greece, which would become a staple of the WRC circuit to this day, and the Rallye du Maroc.
The 1974 World Rally Championship was the second season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). Due to the worldwide oil crisis, it was significantly reduced from its inaugural season, consisting of 8 events versus the previous 13 events. Notably absent were the Monte Carlo and Swedish rallies, though these would return the next year and remain part of the series to this day. However, other rallies such as those in Poland and Austria would never return to the WRC calendar. 1974 was the only year the WRC held two events in North America, though it would mark the last year for both of these events on the world stage.
The 1973 World Rally Championship was the inaugural season for the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC) format. It consisted of 13 events, each held in a different country of the world. Many of the events would be staples of the series through to today, including Monte Carlo, Sweden, Tour de Corse, and the RAC Rally, while others would soon be replaced in the schedule. As with following seasons, gravel events formed the majority of the schedule. Two pure tarmac and one snow and ice rally were also included, as well as three events held on a mixture of soft and hard surface roads.
The 1999 World Rally Championship was the 27th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 14 rallies. Tommi Mäkinen won his fourth drivers' world championship driving for Mitsubishi, ahead of Richard Burns and Didier Auriol. The manufacturers' title was won by Toyota, ahead of Subaru and Mitsubishi.
The 1998 World Rally Championship was the 26th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 13 rallies. Tommi Mäkinen won his third consecutive drivers' world championship driving for Mitsubishi, ahead of Carlos Sainz and Colin McRae. The manufacturers' title was won by Mitsubishi, ahead of Toyota and Subaru. This year also marked the Ford Escort's last full-season works outing before being replaced by the Ford Focus WRC in 1999. The season ended in dramatic fashion when Carlos Sainz's Corolla WRC stopped approximately 300 metres from the finishing line in the final stage at Margam due to mechanical failure, thus surrendering his fourth place on the rally and handing the title to Mäkinen.
The 1997 World Rally Championship was the 25th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season saw many changes in the championship. Most notably, Group A was partially replaced by the World Rally Car with manufacturers given the option which regulations to construct to. One inherent benefit to manufacturers by adopting WRC regulations was removing the need to mass-produce road-going versions of the cars that they competed with, under the previous rules for homologation. This meant that vehicles such as the Escort RS Cosworth and Subaru Impreza Turbo no longer had to be mass-produced for general sale in order to compete at World Championship level, and thus acting as a means of attracting increased competition and involvement by manufacturers. In the few years that follow, the Championship saw the added presence of WRC cars from companies such as Toyota, Hyundai, Seat, Citroën, and Peugeot, who would all compete under WRC regulations without having to manufacture equivalent specialised road cars for public sale. Both Ford and Subaru switched to WRC in 1997, except Mitsubishi who stayed with Group A to maintain the links to their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution road cars. Subaru's transition was much more gradual for similar reasons with the early Subaru Impreza WRCs still largely Group A in nature.
The 1996 World Rally Championship was the 24th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 9 rallies. As a result of their 1995 disqualification, Toyota Team Europe were not allowed to compete in this year's championship, so only three works teams contested the championship. The drivers' world championship was won by Tommi Mäkinen in a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3, ahead of Colin McRae and Carlos Sainz. The manufacturers' title was won by Subaru.
The 1995 World Rally Championship was the 23rd season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). The season consisted of 8 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Colin McRae in a Subaru Impreza 555, ahead of team-mate Carlos Sainz. The manufacturers' title was won by Subaru.
The 1994 World Rally Championship was the 22nd season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 10 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Didier Auriol in a Toyota Celica Turbo 4WD, ahead of Carlos Sainz and Juha Kankkunen. The manufacturers' title was won by Toyota, ahead of Subaru and Ford.
The 1992 World Rally Championship was the 20th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season consisted of 14 rallies. Carlos Sainz won his second drivers' world championship in a Toyota Celica GT-Four ST185, ahead of Juha Kankkunen and Didier Auriol. The manufacturers' title was won by Lancia, ahead of Toyota and Ford.
The 1989 World Rally Championship was the 17th season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). The season consisted of 13 rallies, with some adjustments to the schedule versus the previous season. The WRC ended its participation in North America by removing the Olympus Rally from the schedule, implementing in its place Rally Australia. An anomaly in the schedule was that 1989 was the only year in which the Swedish Rally and the Rallye de Monte Carlo were switched in place, with the Swedish event taking place to start the year. This made it the second and last time that Monte Carlo would not mark the first event of the WRC season until the 2009 season.
The 1991 World Rally Championship was the 19th season of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) World Rally Championship (WRC). The season consisted of 14 rallies. The drivers' world championship was won by Juha Kankkunen in a Lancia Delta Integrale 16V, ahead of Carlos Sainz and Didier Auriol. The manufacturers' title was won by Lancia, ahead of Toyota and Mitsubishi.
