2013 World Rally Championship

Calendar and event changes

• The route of the Acropolis Rally was heavily revised; where the 2012 event was run over, the 2013 rally route was cut back to just, held over two days of competition.
• Rally Australia is scheduled to return to the calendar, replacing the Rally New Zealand as part of the event-sharing agreement established between the two events in 2008. The route for the event was adjusted from that used in 2011, with existing stages variously merged and trimmed down to make way for new stages and create a compact route that was as long as possible.
• The route of the Rallye Deutschland was changed for 2013, with the start moving from Trier to Cologne. The first leg of the event included a series of brand-new stages between the two cities that formed the first leg of the event before the competitors arrive in Trier, which served as the base for the rally.
• Rally de Catalunya, which had been the final event of 2012, was moved back to the final weekend of October to become the penultimate event of the season. The rally will feature a revised route for 2013, with the introduction of night stages and a more even split between tarmac and gravel roads than in previous years.
• The Rally Italia Sardegna was brought forward, from October to June.
• The Wales Rally GB will return to its traditional end-of-season date, having been brought forward to September for the 2012 season in a failed bid to promote tourism in the region. The event was relocated from Cardiff to Deeside in the County of Flintshire. This move enabled event organisers to introduce a brand-new route for the 2013 event, the rally run through the regions of Snowdonia and Denbighshire. More than half the stages will either be brand-new or returning after an absence of over twenty years, and will include a return to Gwydyr, a stage which has not featured in the route since the 1960s.
• The Rally Mexico featured a heavily revised route, which saw the introduction of several brand-new stages and the reconfiguration of older ones.
• The route of Rally Sweden crossed over the Norwegian border to include stages previously used in Rally Norway.

  Signed teams and drivers

World Rally Championship

Team changes

• Citroën will expand its works team, the Citroën Total Abu Dhabi World Rally Team, to become a three-car operation, with the team's third car to be run part-time. The Abu Dhabi Citroën Total World Rally Team will run two additional cars as a satellite team of the works outfit which is eligible to score manufacturers' points independently of the works team.
• Ford will no longer provide manufacturer support to its teams in 2013. The M-Sport Ford World Rally Team will still operate as a WRC team and be eligible to score World Championship points, with the team having acquired backing from Qatar to run three cars. Like Citroën, M-Sport's entries were structured into two teams that are able to score points independently of one another; in the absence of a Ford factory team, the Qatar M-Sport World Rally Team became the de facto lead team, and the Qatar World Rally Team was set up as a satellite operation.
• Hyundai will return to the series in 2014 as a manufacturer after an eleven-year absence. The company has announced plans to compete with the i20 WRC at selected events in 2013, ahead of a full championship campaign in 2014. Hyundai had previously competed in the WRC from 2000 to 2003 with the Accent WRC.
• In October 2012, Mini formally terminated their factory-supported WRC programme, but stated that as the John Cooper Works WRC had met the FIA's homologation requirements for World Rally Cars, they would make the car available to customer teams who wished to compete with it. Prodrive announced their intentions to continue campaigning with cars, but Team Mini Portugal, Palmeirinha Rally and the Armindo Araújo World Rally Team were closed down.
• Following the closure of Team Mini Portugal, several members of Motorsport Italia—the organisation that prepared and managed the Team Mini Portugal entries in 2012—formed a new team with the backing of Polish oil conglomerate Grupa Lotos, to be known as Lotos Team WRC. The team later switched to competing with a Ford Fiesta RS WRC.
• Volkswagen will enter the championship as a manufacturer team, entering two Polo R WRCs for a full-season campaign – to be headed by Sébastien Ogier and co-driver Julien Ingrassia – who contested the 2012 season with a Škoda Fabia S2000.

  Driver changes

• Chris Atkinson, who made several guest appearances with a variety of teams in 2012, will drive for the Abu Dhabi Citroën team at events where Dani Sordo will drive for sister team Citroën Abu Dhabi.
• Nasser Al-Attiyah, who contested the 2012 season with Citroën will switch to Ford for 2013, driving for Qatar M-Sport, where he will compete in selected events on the 2013 calendar.
• Khalid Al Qassimi will return to the World Rally Championship in 2013, after spending 2012 on sabbatical. Having spent most of his competitive career at the WRC level driving for Ford, Al Qassimi will switch to Citroën for the 2013 season, driving a DS3 prepared by Citroën Racing.
• Bryan Bouffier, who won the 2011 Rallye Monte Carlo, will make his debut in a WRC-spec car at the Rallye Monte Carlo driving a privately entered Citroën DS3 WRC.
• 2012 Production Car Champion Benito Guerra will make his debut in a WRC-spec car at the Rally Sweden.
• Juho Hänninen will return to the WRC after a four-year absence, driving a Ford Fiesta prepared by M-Sport at selected events on the 2013 calendar. In the time since his last appearance at the WRC level in 2007, Hänninen won the 2010 Intercontinental Rally Challenge, 2011 Super 2000 World Rally Championship and 2012 European Rally Championship titles.
• Michał Kościuszko will make his World Rally Car debut, driving a Mini John Cooper Works WRC prepared by Italian entrant Lotos Team WRC. Kościuszko later moved to M-Sport.
• Jari-Matti Latvala will partner Sébastien Ogier driving for Volkswagen. Latvala described Ford's decision to end its works programme as the key factor that influenced his decision to change teams.
• At the 2012 Paris Motor Show, nine-time World Champion Sébastien Loeb announced that he would only compete at selected events during the 2013 season, confirming his entry in the Rallye Monte Carlo, but revealing that he had "no fixed plans" for the remainder of the season. At Citroën's formal team launch, Loeb confirmed that his programme for the 2013 season would consist of just four events, and later announced that he would venture out into other motorsport categories, including the FIA GT Series and the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb.
• Andreas Mikkelsen will compete part-time in a Volkswagen Polo R WRC, joining the championship at the Rally of Portugal.
• Thierry Neuville will move from Citroën's junior team to Qatar M-Sport. Prior to his move to M-Sport, Citroën had planned to offer Neuville a place in their factory team, driving in Sébastien Loeb's place at the nine rounds Loeb will not appear at in 2013.
• Evgeny Novikov was promoted from M-Sport's satellite team to the de facto manufacturer team.
• Mads Østberg will leave the Adapta World Rally Team to join Qatar M-Sport.
• Henning Solberg will return to the WRC with a privately entered Ford Fiesta after missing most of the 2012 season when his team, the Go Fast Energy World Rally Team withdrew after two rounds.
• Petter Solberg, the 2003 World Drivers' Champion, announced that he would not participate in the 2013 season after he was unable to secure a drive.
• Dani Sordo will return to Citroën World Rally Team after two years developing the Mini John Cooper Works WRC with the Prodrive WRC Team. Sordo will be nominated to score manufacturer points in events where Sébastien Loeb is not competing.
• Ott Tänak lost his seat with M-Sport.
• Matthew Wilson will return to the World Rally Championship, making a guest appearance at the Rally Sweden after Nasser Al-Attiyah fell ill before the event. Wilson last competed in the 2012 Wales Rally GB, after being forced to miss most of the 2012 season due to injury.