Rally Chile, the second South American round of the 2025 World Rally Championship, gets underway tonight. Among the crews crossing the starting ramp this evening are Kajetan Kajetanowicz and Maciej Szczepaniak, who have completed official shakedown before the start of the proper competition.
Chile hosts the best rally crews of the world for the fourth time, as round eleven of the 2025 WRC season. For Kajetanowicz and Szczepaniak, this is their sixth start in this campaign and another chance to boost their points tally in the WRC2 Challenger standings. The ORLEN Rally Team duo are looking to build on last year’s successful performance on the western coast of South America. They have been intensively preparing for the forthcoming challenge since the beginning of the week. On Monday, Kajto and Maciek worked on finding the right setup of their Toyota during testing session and the next two days were spent on the recce, with both driver and co-driver trying to identify numerous traps hidden on the stages, famous for being aggressive for tyres in past seasons.
Thursday’s schedule started with the Campamento Conuco shakedown (6.79 kms). Kajetan and Maciek completed one run of this test – just as before Rally del Paraguay, during the first pass, broadcast on television and online. The crew performed a final check of the car, taking care of their tyres – which, according to the regulations, belong to limited allocation for the whole rally.
This is the sixth round of our 2025 World Rally Championship campaign – Rally Chile. Even though the special stages are the same as last year, they are always different because gravel routes are constantly changing. The roads are repaired, fixed with different kind of surface, so grip levels change as frequently as the weather. Both rain and sun await us. Fog is also forecast for two of three days of competition, so it will be a demanding rally, like every WRC round. The stages are fast and narrow, each day is a bit different. Changing grip levels and very aggressive surface on some stages might cause some problems but all crews will be in the same situation. I cannot wait. I hope the fans will be with us
– Kajetan Kajetanowicz, the ORLEN Rally Team driver, said ahead of the rally.
The official opening ceremony takes place at night (European time). It is always a spectacular show during every round in South America – a continent full of motorsport passion. Proper competition starts on Friday and the field face sixteen special stages with total length of almost 307 kilometres. Heavy rain and fog, challenging the crews already during the recce, might make it even more difficult for the competitors. The opening leg consists of three stages – Pulpería (19.72 kms), Rere (13.34 kms), and San Rosendo (23.32 kms) – each of them run twice.
Starts of Kajetan Kajetanowicz are supported by the title partner of the ORLEN Rally Team – ORLEN S.A., as well as technical partner Delphi and ORLEN OIL.
