Johnston’s targeting a ’strong finish’ in the Swedish snow

THE World Rally Championship has moved to its northern most base of the season this coming weekend for Rally Sweden, which Fintona’s Aaron Johnston always looks forward to.

The 30-year-old co-driver, who will be competing alongside Takamoto Katsuta in a Toyota Gazoo Racing Rally1 Yaris admits that after competing in approaching 20 winter events, the novelty of pelting at full speed through snow-lined forests hasn’t lost its novelty.

But after a disappointing end to a promising start to the 2025 WRC season in Monte Carlo, the pair are determined that enjoying the thrills of the Swedish snow are one thing, but earning a strong finish is their priority.

“It’s a surface we’re only on once per year,” he said. “I’ve done probably 15 winter events at this stage, but it’s still nice to go back every year and go flat out through the forests with big snowbanks, on a surface you can barely stand up on!

“I still enjoy it and it’s a surface that Taka enjoys as well, so hopefully we can get a good result come Sunday. A strong finish would be the target and everything after that is a bonus.”

As well as reacquainting themselves to competing on snow and ice, the Toyota duo and their rivals will have to do so on new tyres after the WRC switched manufacturers to Hankook this year.

And while Johnston doesn’t think that will have a massive bearing on things, temperatures in Umea just might.

“The test was pretty OK, the car was good, it was just about learning the new tyres, which is a bit of a change in he feeling with them, but it’s the same for everybody so there’s not really much to say apart from it is what it is,” he added.

“We’ll just have to adapt to them in Umea and we’ll see what the conditions are like, whether they are freezing or quite warm. It looks like it will hover around zero, which is fine. As long as it doesn’t rise to +4 or thereabouts we’ll be fine. We’ll play it by ear and take it from there.”

Rally Sweden gets underway this morning with Shakedown and ends on Sunday.