Sébastien Ogier (Volkswagen Polo R WRC) on the Baião stage, Rally de Portugal 2016. Photo: Harpagornis / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Rally de Portugal has been part of the World Rally Championship since the series’ first season in 1973. It is not on the 15-round 2027 calendar WRC Promoter published this morning, and the announcement never mentions it.
The release, approved by the FIA World Motor Sport Council, leads with three additions. Rally US runs August 26-29, the championship’s first round in the United States since the Olympus Rally in 1988. Rally Scotland, based in Aberdeen and backed by Motorsport UK and the Scottish Government, runs September 30 to October 3, the first British round since 2019. An asphalt Rally d’Italia on the roads of Lazio, with Rome as its backdrop, runs July 8-11.
Fourteen rounds made up the 2026 season. Adding three and landing on 15 means two had to go, and neither is named: Portugal, and Sardinia, which hosted Italy’s round this year.
Portugal’s three-year deal
On May 22, 2025, the championship’s own website announced that the Automóvel Club de Portugal (ACP) and WRC Promoter had confirmed the rally for the 2026, 2027 and 2028 calendars. Simon Larkin, the promoter’s senior events director, called it “an important step for the WRC and for Portugal.”
The ACP published its account on September 29. The club says the rally had been slotted for May 13-16, 2027, until the promoter changed the calendar on the last day of drafting it, with the stated aim of making the schedule as geographically diverse and intercontinental as possible. The ACP says the two sides have started talks about a return in 2028.
Neither the ACP statement nor today’s release refers to the 2025 agreement. Nobody has said in writing whether it was renegotiated, broken or paid out, or whether the 2028 date it promised still stands.
Portugal has been off the calendar before. The championship’s own history puts the event in every season since 1973 apart from a break between 2002 and 2006. Its current version runs out of Matosinhos, near Porto, and uses stages including Fafe and Arganil, where crowds run into the hundreds of thousands.
Sardinia out, Rome in
Italy’s switch was announced in September 2025, when the Automobile Club d’Italia (ACI) signed a five-year contract with WRC Promoter and the European Rally Championship took over Sardinia for 2027 through 2030. Rally di Roma Capitale stayed on the ERC calendar this year as a rehearsal. That announcement made Rome conditional on FIA and promoter approval of the location, stages and organisation. The World Motor Sport Council’s sign-off on today’s calendar settles it.
The change swaps an October gravel event on an island for a July asphalt event on the mainland. ACI sub-commissioner Giovanni Tombolato said at the time that the new rules could let Italian drivers fight for top positions, given how many tarmac specialists the country produces. Rome joins Croatia, the Canary Islands and Japan as the calendar’s other asphalt rounds, plus Monte-Carlo’s mix of ice and tarmac in January.
Rally US has dates, no address
The release names no state, host city or organiser for Rally US. The last official word came on January 27, when the championship set up a candidate event for June 11-17 this year on stages in Tennessee and Kentucky, assessed by FIA delegates, with Podium Event Partners as proposed promoter. Today’s release doesn’t say whether that event passed, or whether Rally US will run on those roads.
Tennessee already has a working rally scene. It is where Ott Tänak won the Overmountain Rally in a factory Toyota GR Corolla last month, on an American Rally Association weekend that also decided part of Seth Quintero’s title chase.
The release calls the U.S. round an important platform for manufacturer partners, “particularly Ford.” The FIA’s October 1 announcement of Ford’s return puts Ford Racing’s direct involvement at 2028 and the debut of its new Rally1 car, built with M-Sport, at 2029. Rally US’s first running, in August 2027, comes before either.
What the calendar leaves out
The release gives dates for five of the 15 rounds: Monte-Carlo (January 21-24), Rome, Rally US, Scotland and the Saudi Arabia finale (November 25-28). The other ten are described only in sequence. Sweden and Safari Rally Kenya follow Monte-Carlo, Croatia, the Canaries and Japan form an asphalt run, the Acropolis opens the summer gravel rounds, Estonia and Finland run back to back, and Paraguay and Chile pair up before Saudi Arabia. The text doesn’t say where Rome, the U.S. and Scotland fall among them.
The year also opens the WRC27 technical rules, under which the FIA caps the price of a ready-to-compete asphalt-spec car at €345,000. Ford is the fourth constructor to commit to building one.
Rally US starts in 322 days. The next document to watch for is the one that names its base, and the next from Portugal is whatever the ACP and the promoter agree about 2028.
Should a founding round with a signed deal through 2028 have kept its place, or was dropping Portugal a fair price for putting the WRC back in America?
Sources: WRC Promoter 2027 calendar release (October 8, 2026); WRC.com, Rally de Portugal renewal (May 22, 2025); ACP / Rally de Portugal statement (September 29, 2026); WRC.com, Italy mainland move (September 23, 2025); WRC.com, U.S. candidate event (January 27, 2026); FIA, Ford Racing return (October 1, 2026); FIA, 2026 WRC calendar (July 31, 2025). Featured image: Sébastien Ogier, Rally de Portugal 2016, by Harpagornis via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
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