Heikkilä with first win in Sweden

Finnish driver Mikko Heikkilä won his first ERC event in Sweden after some late drama on the sunday stages. Photo: Christian Flodin

The third round of the ERC 2026 went to classic rally soil in Värmland in Sweden. The county has been hosting the WRC Rally Sweden for many decades, before moving to Umeå after 2020. 2023 was the first year of Bauhaus Royal Rally of Scandinavia, with several stages being the same as before, but this time in the summer.

19-year old Estonian Jaspar Vaher won the first stage on friday night, and held on to it through all saturday. On SS12 out of 16 stages in total, Vaher crashed and Teemu Suninen was now the leader with 4.8 seconds down to Heikkilä. On SS13, the first stage after midday service, Suninen had increased the lead to 5,4 seconds down. On SS14 Heikkilä picked up a right-rear tyre damage, close to retirement but managed to close the gap to 2.8 seconds up on Suninen. On the second to last stage Suninen crashed. With just one stage to go, Heikkilä had 23.7 seconds down to second placed part-time WRC1 M-sport driver Martins Sesks.
Third place was taken by the really local driver Isak Reiersen, living in the hosting city of Karlstad. Just outside the podium was another swede, junior ERC champion Calle Carlberg. Carlberg now driving in the jWRC had a crash in Portugal just a few weeks ago, seemed to enjoy the forest roads of Värmland.

Carlberg teammate Patrik Hallberg was about to finish fifth, but a flat tire without any unused extra tires had Hallberg to retire on the road section. On saturday Hallberg managed to equal the longest jump from famous Colins Crest, with 47 meters. Since this was the longest jump in the competition, Hallberg was rewarded by the sponsor Bauhaus with a mini-digger, which seems like a fair comfort from the late retire.

Written by: Christian Flodin