Thierry Neuville Heads Into Paraguay With Hyundai Expecting a Major Step Forward

Thierry Neuville is heading into Rally del Paraguay 2026 with Hyundai carrying a clear objective: turn the lessons of the opening rounds of the season into genuine front-running performance on one of the WRC’s most unpredictable gravel rallies.

The second edition of the WRC Rally del Paraguay takes place from August 27–30, 2026, with the event based around Encarnación and featuring approximately 359 competitive kilometres across 22 stages. The rally returns to the distinctive red-earth roads of Itapúa, where changing grip, deepening ruts, dust and sudden rain can transform the character of a stage within minutes.

For Hyundai, the event represents more than another opportunity to collect championship points. It is another test of how far the Hyundai i20 N Rally1 has progressed after a difficult 2025 campaign and a season in which the team has continued learning how to extract consistent performance from its package and Hankook tyres.

Neuville knows the roads particularly well after finishing third at the inaugural Rally del Paraguay in 2025. Hyundai says its crews were competitive throughout that event, with Neuville and Martijn Wydaeghe eventually recovering to the podium after a difficult opening phase and unpredictable rain on the Power Stage.

This time, however, Hyundai arrives with more information, more experience and a revised understanding of the gravel tyre package.

And that is where the real intrigue begins.

Why the Tire Story Matters So Much in Paraguay

The Hankook Dynapro R213 has become one of the most important technical variables in the modern WRC gravel battle.

Hankook became the WRC’s exclusive tyre supplier in 2025, meaning every Rally1 manufacturer has had to adapt its cars and setups to the Korean manufacturer’s rubber. Hyundai’s 2026 programme has therefore been shaped not only by developments to the i20 N Rally1 itself, but also by the growing bank of data accumulated with the new control tyre.

The Dynapro R213 was introduced during the 2026 season after drivers raised concerns about tyre performance and reliability on particularly demanding gravel events.

Hankook developed the tyre with a revised compound and construction aimed at improving durability, flexibility and grip. The manufacturer specifically highlighted improved performance on rough gravel and greater adaptability when conditions become difficult.

That makes Paraguay an especially interesting environment for the tyre.

The event combines fast gravel sections with roads that can deteriorate rapidly after repeated passes. Hyundai’s own event preview warns that the roads can become deeply rutted, while grip can change dramatically between sections. Sudden rain can make the surface extremely slippery, and punctures remain a significant threat.

In other words, the rally does not simply reward outright speed.

It rewards a car that can remain predictable when the road changes.

Neuville’s Confidence Comes From Last Year’s Experience

Neuville enters Paraguay with something many of his rivals do not have: direct experience of how quickly the rally can change.

During the 2025 event, the Belgian struggled to find the ideal balance early in the weekend before Hyundai found a way to improve its performance. By Sunday, Neuville and Wydaeghe had dramatically recovered their pace, including a stage victory on Mision Jesuitica Trinidad, before securing third overall.

That experience could prove crucial in 2026.

Hyundai’s latest Paraguay preview makes it clear that Neuville sees the rally as a genuine opportunity rather than simply another round to survive.

He has emphasized that Hyundai was competitive for much of the previous edition and that the team learned valuable lessons from the event’s rapidly changing grip and high-speed sections. The objective this time is to fight for the leading positions and convert that competitiveness into a stronger final result.

That expectation is significant because Hyundai has already shown flashes of genuine speed during the 2026 season.

Neuville secured Hyundai’s first victory of the 2026 WRC season in Portugal, while he later finished second at the Acropolis Rally Greece, another event where tyre management and mechanical resilience played a huge role.

The message from those performances is increasingly difficult to ignore.

When Hyundai gets the balance between car setup, tyre behaviour and road conditions right, the i20 N Rally1 can fight at the front.

The Real Test Is Consistency

The biggest question surrounding Hyundai before Paraguay is not whether the team has enough speed.

It is whether that speed can remain available when conditions become unpredictable.

That has been one of the defining challenges of the modern WRC.

The 2026 season is the second year of the Hankook control-tyre era, and Hyundai has had considerably more opportunity to understand how the i20 N Rally1 interacts with the rubber. Hyundai itself acknowledged before the season that the introduction of Hankook tyres in 2025 added another layer of complexity to finding the ideal setup. By 2026, however, the team had accumulated significantly more data.

That experience could become particularly valuable in Paraguay.

The first pass through a stage may produce one level of grip.

The second pass can be completely different.

A section that initially feels stable can develop ruts. Loose gravel can be swept away. Rocks can become exposed. Rain can turn a fast section into a completely different challenge.

For Neuville, this means confidence will be just as important as raw performance.

And that is precisely why the improved Dynapro R213 specification could become one of the most important pieces of the puzzle.

A Familiar Tire With a Different Character

Calling the Dynapro R213 simply a “new tyre” does not tell the whole story.

The concept behind the 2026 development is evolutionary.

Hankook retained the Dynapro identity while modifying key elements of the gravel tyre, including the compound, tread pattern and construction. The changes were designed to provide greater robustness while also improving the tyre’s ability to work effectively across a wider range of conditions.

Hankook has also described the tyre as being designed to offer improved durability and grip on rough gravel surfaces.

That matters enormously for Paraguay.

A tyre that delivers enormous grip for a few kilometres but loses performance rapidly can become a liability. A tyre that sacrifices too much performance for durability can leave a driver unable to fight for stage wins.

The ideal solution is somewhere in between.

That is where Neuville’s feedback and Hyundai’s engineering work become crucial.

Why Paraguay Could Expose the Strongest and Weakest Cars

The Rally del Paraguay has a very different personality from many traditional WRC gravel events.

Hyundai describes the roads as featuring red earth, changing grip, fast sections and potentially severe deterioration. The event also contains a significant amount of competitive distance, creating an extended test of the car, tyres and crew.

The 2026 event is scheduled to feature 22 stages and 358.99 kilometres of competition, making tyre management a central consideration rather than a minor detail.

That creates several potential pressure points for Hyundai.

If the i20 N Rally1 can generate strong traction without overheating the tyre, Neuville could become a serious threat.

If the tyre can withstand the rougher sections while maintaining predictable handling, Hyundai could gain time in areas where competitors are forced to manage their pace.

But if the balance is wrong, the same roads could expose weaknesses immediately.

This is why Neuville’s confidence in the latest package matters so much.

Hyundai’s 2026 Progress Is Already Visible

The Paraguay opportunity does not exist in isolation.

Hyundai entered 2026 after a turbulent previous season, but the team has gradually rebuilt momentum.

Neuville has already demonstrated that he can win with the current package, while his second-place finish in Greece showed that Hyundai can remain competitive even in an event notorious for punishing tyres and cars.

Adrien Fourmaux has also contributed to the team’s momentum, including a podium finish in Estonia. Hyundai’s own season reporting described the team as progressively improving, with Neuville himself reporting increasing confidence in the car.

The Paraguay round therefore arrives at an interesting moment.

Hyundai is no longer simply searching for evidence that the car can be competitive.

It is trying to turn occasional front-running performances into a repeatable pattern.

Hayden Paddon Adds Another Layer to Hyundai’s Paraguay Strategy

There is also an important change inside Hyundai’s Paraguay lineup.

Following Ott Tänak’s departure at the end of the previous season, Hayden Paddon will drive the third Hyundai i20 N Rally1 alongside full-season drivers Neuville and Fourmaux. Paddon brings extensive rally experience and a previous connection with Hyundai, making his return another potentially valuable source of feedback for the team.

That matters because Paraguay is still a relatively new WRC destination.

The event only made its world championship debut in 2025, meaning teams are still building their historical databases compared with established rallies such as Finland, Greece or Portugal.

Every additional crew becomes another source of information.

Road-condition feedback, tyre behaviour, setup observations and stage characteristics can all help engineers understand where the performance window lies.

For Hyundai, having three experienced crews on the gravel roads could therefore be more valuable than the championship standings alone suggest.

The Bigger Picture: 2027 Is Already Approaching

There is another reason why every development decision in 2026 carries extra significance.

The current Rally1 era is approaching its final full season before the WRC undergoes a major technical reset for 2027.

Hyundai has already acknowledged that the approaching regulations are influencing its development priorities, while the team is also preparing for its wider motorsport commitments.

That means the remaining 2026 rallies are about more than individual victories.

They are also about understanding what works.

Every kilometre provides data.

Every tyre failure provides information.

Every setup change tells engineers something about how the car behaves.

And every podium helps establish whether the current development direction is delivering the desired result.

Paraguay therefore becomes another piece of a much larger technical puzzle.

What Neuville Really Wants From Paraguay

The most important element of Neuville’s message is perhaps the simplest one.

He does not appear to be approaching Paraguay with the mentality of merely protecting a championship position.

His stated objective is much more ambitious: wins and the strongest possible results. Hyundai’s official preview makes clear that Neuville wants to fight at the front after seeing enough pace from the car to believe that such a target is realistic.

That creates a fascinating situation.

The team has an experienced driver.

It has a car that has already won in 2026.

It has more knowledge of the Hankook tyre than it possessed one year ago.

It has three crews with significant rally experience.

And it is returning to a rally where Neuville already stood on the podium.

The ingredients are there.

The question is whether they can all work together at the same time.

Could Paraguay Become Hyundai’s Turning Point?

That is ultimately the question hanging over the rally.

If Neuville can combine his experience from 2025 with Hyundai’s improved understanding of the Hankook Dynapro R213, the result could be much more than another podium.

It could demonstrate that Hyundai has finally found a more consistent performance window for its Rally1 package.

The road will decide.

Paraguay’s red-earth stages are unlikely to offer Hyundai or its rivals any easy answers. The changing grip, roughening surfaces, high-speed sections, dust and unpredictable weather mean that even the fastest car must remain adaptable.

For Neuville, that may actually be an advantage.

He has already experienced the rally’s surprises.

He knows how quickly the conditions can change.

He knows what happened when the weather turned against Hyundai last year.

And now he returns with a year of additional data and a more developed understanding of the tyres beneath his Hyundai.

That combination could be powerful.

The First Answers Will Come in Paraguay

The 2026 Rally del Paraguay will officially run from August 27 through August 30, with the WRC field returning to the red-earth roads of Itapúa for the second time. Hyundai will field Neuville, Fourmaux and Paddon, while the entry list also includes major contenders from Toyota and M-Sport Ford.

For Neuville, the target is clear.

For Hyundai, the stakes are arguably even higher.

The team needs to know whether its recent progress can survive one of the most demanding combinations of changing gravel, tyre stress and unpredictable weather on the calendar.

And the Hankook Dynapro R213 may be one of the decisive factors.

The tyre is familiar.

The specification is evolving.

The car is improving.

And Neuville believes Hyundai has enough pace to aim high.

If everything comes together in Paraguay, the story could quickly shift from another WRC weekend to something considerably bigger: a genuine turning point in Hyundai’s 2026 campaign.