page_title: 2020 World Rally Championship
section_title: Calendar changes
hierarchical_section_title: 2020 World Rally Championship / Calendar / Calendar changes
caption_attribution_description: Gekko Ypres Rally 2012
context_page_description: The 2020 FIA World Rally Championship is the forty-eighth season of the World Rally Championship, an auto racing competition recognised by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile as the highest class of international rallying. Teams and crews are competing in seven rallies for the World Rally Championships for Drivers, Co-drivers and Manufacturers. Crews are free to compete in cars complying with World Rally Car and Group R regulations; however, only manufacturers competing with World Rally Cars homologated under regulations introduced in 2017 are eligible to score points in the Manufacturers' championship. The championship began in January 2020 with the Rallye Monte Carlo and is due to conclude in November 2020 with Ypres Rally. The series is supported by the World Rally Championship-2, World Rally Championship-3 and Junior World Rally Championship categories at selected events.
  Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja are the defending Drivers' and Co-drivers' Champions, having secured their maiden titles at the 2019 Rally Catalunya. Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT, the team Tänak and Järveoja compete for, are the defending Manufacturers' Champions.
context_section_description: With the addition of Rally Chile to the calendar in 2019, the FIA opened the tender process for new events to join the championship in 2020. Bids to revive Rally Japan and the Safari Rally were received, and candidate events were run in 2019. Both events were accepted to the 2020 calendar, as was a proposal to revive Rally New Zealand. However, none of the aforementioned events were run due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
  The Safari Rally was scheduled to be run as a World Championship event for the first time since 2002. The event is to be based in the Kenyan capital Nairobi and feature stages around Lake Naivasha. In contrast to the event's traditional endurance format, which featured stages hundreds of kilometres long, the 2020 Safari Rally was planned to follow a compact route to comply with FIA regulations mandating the maximum route distance.
  Rally Japan was scheduled to return to the calendar for the first time since 2010, replacing Rally Australia as the final round of the championship. The rally was scheduled to move away from its original headquarters in Hokkaidō to a new base in Nagoya and was to be run on tarmac rather than gravel.
  Rally New Zealand was scheduled to return to the calendar for the first time since 2012. The event was planned to return to Auckland.
  The addition of these events saw the Tour de Corse and the Rallies of Catalunya and Australia removed from the calendar. Organisers of Rally Catalunya agreed to forfeit their place on the 2020 calendar as part of a rotation system that will see European events host rallies in two out of three calendar years. The Tour de Corse was removed in response to concerns from teams about the logistics of visiting Corsica, while Rally Australia was removed as the event's base in a regional centre rather than a major metropolitan area meant that the rally struggled to attract spectators. Rally Chile was included on the original calendar, but was later removed in the face of ongoing political unrest in the country. The FIA sought a replacement event to ensure that the calendar retained its planned fourteen rounds, but were unable to do so.
  The Rallies in Italy were postponed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Events in Argentina, Portugal, Kenya, Finland, New Zealand, Germany, Great Britain and Japan were cancelled. Organisers of the championship announced that they were considering adding events to the schedule that had not been part of the original calendar. Estonia, Belgium, Latvia, Croatia and Czech Republic were among the countries who had expressed interest in hosting the event.
  The running date of Rally Turkey was moved forward by a week, which facilitates the opportunity for additional rounds. Further calendar options may include Ypres Rally and Croatia Rally. Following the cancellation of Rallye Deutschland, the running date of Rally Sardegna was moving forward by three weeks. This decision was intended to avoid the clash with the Imola Grand Prix.
  On 2 July 2020, it was announced that the season would return with an updated calendar. The season is expected to resume with newcomers Rally Estonia hosting the resuming round between 4 and 6 September. The country would become the thirty-third nation to stage a championship round in the WRC.
  On 19 August 2020, it was announced that Ypres Rally, officially Renties Ypres Rally Belgium, would replace Rally Japan to become the final round of the season. This means Belgium is set to be the thirty-fourth country to hold a WRC event.
caption: Calendar newcomer Ypres Rally is set to be the season's finale.
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