Martijn Wydaghe reveals that he and Thierry Neuville followed their own strategy during the 2024 season and admits that they have not realised what they have done yet while he says that they did not give up despite the early problems in Japan.
Neuville and Wydaeghe are the first crew from Hyundai and Belgium who managed to become WRC Champions while they were leading the championship since Rallye Monte Carlo. Despite the fact that they were opening the road on the gravel rallies, they showed great consistency during the season and were able to score points in every rally. Ott Tanak and Martin Jarveoja were their closest rivals heading to Rally Japan, but the last ones' hopes ended when they crashed on the opening stage of Sunday. On the other hand, Neuville and Wydaeghe were outside the top ten at the end of Friday due to turbo issues, but they managed to climb into seventh place at the end of Saturday and to score some points from that day. However, although they managed to become the first Hyundai crew who clinched the driver and the co-driver titles, their team missed the opportunity to become the 2024 Manufacturer Champion despite the fact that they had a 15-point advantage over Toyota at the end of Central European Rally.
"There are a lot of emotions at the moment, and we don’t quite realise what we have done", Wydaeghe said.
"This weekend we showed that our best strength is our mental resilience.
"Despite a setback on Friday, we kept believing in ourselves and the team.
"They got the car working again for us that we could be on the pace yesterday.
"All season, we have had our own strategy and it really paid off – never giving up, focusing on a strong Sunday, and this made us world champions.
"Thank you to everyone at Hyundai Motorsport, both in the service park and back at Alzenau".
Photo Credits: Hyundai
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