Finland's 2022 and 2023 world champion Kalle Rovanperä won the race for Toyota. Veteran and eight-time world champion Sebastien Ogier (France) was second, also for Toyota, while teammates Elfyn Evans (Wales, also the overall championship leader) and Takamoto Katsuta (Japan) took third and fourth places, in a clean sweep for the Japanese team. They could have made it five in a row if WRC2 driver Sami Pajari (Finland) hadn't spun off on the last day of the race.

Adrien Fourmaux (M-Sport Ford) was fifth, in a dismal event for Hyundai, who were dogged by mechanical problems all weekend as Tänak and his teammate, reigning champion Thierry Neuville (Belgium), traded seventh and eighth places for much of the time. It was only Pajari's exit that bumped Tänak up to sixth, with Neuville a place behind.

Rally Islas Canarias made its WRC debut as round four of the 2025 season and was the first race of the year to take place on asphalt, with recent widespread anti-tourism protests on the islands seemingly not impacting the event.

Tänak entered the race weekend in overall third place in the driver standings with 49 points, just three behind Neuville.

Although Hyundai tried to solve its problems in various ways, Toyota was clearly ahead in terms of speed all weekend. Hyundai admitted that the Hankook asphalt tires and the i20 itself could not cope well with the conditions; the only fix would have been to make wide-ranging changes, which are forbidden on an actual race weekend.

Post-race, Tänak — whose sole WRC title so far came in 2019, with Toyota — said: "This was a very demanding weekend and it's hard to find the right words."

"We didn't do our homework and Toyota set the bar very high. They did a great job. My car was even more under-steerable in the heat, and for me, the car just doesn't work. It was hard for me to push hard."

Rovanperä performed flawlessly, beating Ogier by almost a minute and failing to come first in only three stages.

The race weekend started well enough for Tänak and his co-driver Martin Järveoja — and for Neuville too — as both pairs finished joint third at Thursday's shakedown stage, the only racing held on day one.

From Friday, the first full day of racing, things went downhill, with Toyota dominant. Tänak was over 40 seconds behind Rovanperä after just three stages, as the mechanical issues already became clear.

This set the pace for the rest of Friday, while another competing Estonian, Romet Jürgenson, racing in the WRC2 category, fared even worse. He and his co-driver Siim Oja had to abandon the race on their first outing after hitting a road barrier.

Another competing Estonian, Romet Jürgenson, racing in the WRC2 category, fared even worse, as he and his co-driver Siim Oja had to abandon the race on the first outing after hitting hit a road barrier.

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Not much changed on Saturday, as Hyundai continued to struggle with tire set-up.

"We can't do much about the suspension or transmission, but we'll try to be in a better position for Sunday," was all Tänak, who had fallen behind Neuville at that point, had to say.

"Today is surprisingly bad. I don't know what's going on. It was bad yesterday, so I don't know how to describe today," he said later.

Sunday, the final day, started badly for M-Sport Ford's Joshua McErlean (Ireland), who had been as high as tenth on Saturday but hit a road barrier on a bend and was forced to retire.

Neuville suffered a flat tire on the penultimate stage, forcing him to fall behind his Estonian teammate, while Rovanperä continued to show the same class he had displayed all weekend, even ahead of the rest of the Toyota pack. They held on to the top five until Pajari's crash into a wooden barrier — again on a bend — scattered debris everywhere and soon forced him to retire, the only highlight for Hyundai.

Apart from a few donuts on the slippery surface of the Gran Canaria Basketball Club, which drivers entered after the serious part of the race was over — an event won by Evans — all that remained was a Hyundai-less podium celebration.

The Welshman, hungry for his first ever WRC drivers' title, continues as overall table leader after four rounds with 109 points after the Canaries, with Rovanperä, who does not race every event, 43 points behind him.

2024 champion Neuville is next with 59, with Ogier and Tänak hot on his heels with 58 and 57 points respectively.

By constructor, Toyota Gazoo Racing World Rally Team has 208 points to Hyundai Shell Mobis World Rally Team's 157 points, with the much smaller M-Sport Ford World Rally Team — the only other team to race at senior WRC level, and for whom Tänak drove for one season in 2023 — in third place.

The WRC 2025 season's next round is in Portugal, May 15–18.

Editor's note: This piece was updated to include the final results.

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