Tantalising Turkish tussle set to decide Euro RX1 title

Yury Belevskiy, Mika Liimatainen and Damian Litwinowicz have unquestionably been the class of the field in the FIA European Rallycross Championship’s top-tier in 2025, although only the Swiss star has so far stood on the highest step of the podium, winning the season curtain-raiser in Portugal prior to winning again – against all odds – next time out in Sweden.

The other two victories have gone the way of Zoltán Koncseg on home soil in Hungary and series newcomer Maiko Tamm three weeks ago in Finland, but over the course of the campaign, it is Liimatainen and Litwinowicz who have challenged Volland Racing ace Belevskiy the most.

Holding a ten-point margin over Liimatainen at the summit of the standings, last year’s championship runner-up might be the favourite going into the Turkish decider, but a rocky run through the heats at Höljes and failures to finish the final at Nyirád and the KymiRing have demonstrated that Belevskiy is far from infallible. Should the inaugural Euro RX3 champion stumble, flying Finn Liimatainen and the ever-consistent Litwinowicz will be poised to pounce.

And then, once Saturday’s racing is done-and-dusted in Istanbul and the laurels have been lifted, the trophy-chasing trio and their Euro RX1 rivals will have the unprecedented opportunity to test their mettle against the dual-surface discipline’s crème de la crème, as ‘wildcard’ entries in the final FIA World Rallycross Championship round of the season. The stakes are high, the tension is palpable – and the action promises to be epic...

“Heading to Türkiye, the battle in Euro RX1 is a pretty tight affair,” mused championship commentator, Andrew Coley. “We’ve seen how close the performances of all three of the title protagonists have been, and we’ve also seen up-and-down results for them all.

“Yury Belevskiy’s two wins at the start of the season could scarcely have been more different. The first of them at Lousada was a complete whitewash – setting the pace in all four heats, taking Top Qualifier honours and thoroughly dominating both the semi-final and final. At Höljes, by contrast, he scraped through the heats, he scraped through his semi-final and he then went on to win the final – that was a brilliant comeback in truly treacherous conditions. 

“Since then, he’s suffered DNFs in the final at both Nyirád and the KymiRing, so he really does need a good, clean weekend in Istanbul. He needs to keep his head and keep calm. Turn One there can be tricky, the walls are close, and Mika Liimatainen will know he’s got to go all-in to try to steal it. He can take a riskier approach as he needs to snatch every point he can from Belevskiy, and Damian Litwinowicz is waiting in the wings should the other two trip up.

“With almost all of the points now awarded only at the end of the event, the most important thing is to make it through to the final to ensure a big score. That will be crucial for all three drivers, and I have no doubt it will be a hugely fun fight to watch...”