End of the road for electric Rallycross
Marcus Grönholm discusses the end of the electric era in World RX and what’s needed to revive the troubled championship
Following the recent cancellation of the FIA World Rallycross championship, two-time World Rally Champion Marcus Grönholm explains why EVs weren’t entirely to blame for the death of the sport, and hints at what might just bring his GRX team back to the World RX grid if the championship returns.
On September 18 this year, the FIA announced that there would be no more World Rallycross for the immediate future. Instead, the sport would return to European Rallycross status for 2026, with a possible return as a World Championship in 2028.
Most markedly of all, the FIA’s move to kill off World RX – albeit temporarily – marked the death knell for EVs in the sport, for the foreseeable future, at least.
Swapping ICE for EV and the ‘Battle of Technologies’
From the outset, it would be easy to blame the all-electric RX1e cars for World RX’s demise. When the EVs debuted in 2022, their whooshing electric motors replaced the artillery-esque banging and popping turbocharged combustion engines – a soundtrack synonymous with World RX since it began in 2014 – enraging many fans.
The fact that the EVs packed over 600bhp and their instant torque fitted well with the short, sharp format of World Rallycross didn’t matter to the more traditional followers of the sport.
Things took another negative turn in 2024. At the World RX of the United Kingdom event at Lydden Hill, a battery fire caused by the Special ONE Racing team’s Lancia Delta Evo-e RX ripped through the paddock, and led to the cancellation of the RX1e class until 2024.
For what would turn out to be the penultimate World RX season, the 2024 World RX season saw EVs compete against their ICE counterparts for victory in what the FIA dubbed the Battle of Technologies.
The Grönholms and World RX
The format continued into 2025, a season which saw KMS man Johan Kristofferson crowned World Rallycross champion for the eighth time. Kristofferson’s record-breaking title wasn’t without controversy, though. The Swede swapped his ICE Volkswagen Polo to the one with a competitive EV powertrain after being soundly beaten at the opening round of the year in Lousada, Portugal.
Despite Kristofferson’s success and the fact that the all-electric RX1e cars won 50% of the races they entered, EVs struggled to prove themselves to fans and the FIA’s announcement appears to signal the end of the EV v ICE era. So EV Powered spoke to Marcus Grönholm to take a more holistic look into how the EV project in World Rallycross ended up here.
As well as being a double World Rally Champion, the Finn turned his hand to rallycross in 2008 after retiring from the WRC at the end of the previous year.
On top of competing in Euro RX and winning on his championship debut in Höljes, Sweden, Grönholm’s GRX rally team competed in World RX from 2017 to 2021. During those five seasons, GRX scored a total of seven victories with Marcus’ son Niclas and Timur Timurzyanov both winning races.
While GRX didn’t compete in the electric era, Niclas drove for the EV-powered, Volvo-backed CE Dealer Team, and secured second place in this year’s WRX championship. From 2022 to 2025, Niclas scored three wins, bringing his World RX career tally to nine victories.
It’s all too easy to blame EVs
“We have to be honest that the noise and drama is very important for World RX fans, and it’s why they didn’t really like the electric cars – that’s clear,” the elder Grönholm explains. “But to blame the collapse of World RX completely on EVs? I don’t think that’s correct.
“CE Dealer had a very good run in the sport. They did everything extremely professionally. Both the EVs by themselves and against the combustion cars, everything looked very good on TV. I’ve driven the PWR-run CE Dealer car several times on promo events, and it’s good fun – it feels like a proper racing car. Trackside, though, the sport was definitely missing something with the electrics.
“I’m also very thankful to Volvo and CE Dealer because Niclas got a full time drive with a professional team, and I didn’t have to get involved with anything like paying bills or finding sponsors,” he laughs.
‘Without fans, there is no motorsport’
The growth and success of Formula E since its 2014 debut season shows that electrified motorsport can do well and attract a new audience, but the world’s first single-seater motorsport championship was coming in fresh without a fanbase. Meanwhile, rallycross as a sport dates back to 1974 and has one of the most die-hard fanbases in motorsport – a fanbase who embrace the noise, dirt and chaos and see it all as core to the sport.
“Without fans, there is no motorsport. It’s that easy,” says Grönholm, but he argues that fans’ doubts about EV racers were compounded by mistakes elsewhere. “In 2025, World RX returned as free to watch on YouTube, and that was a fantastic move because it was always like that from 2014 to 2021. But until last year, the previous promoter put it behind a paywall for God knows what reason. That was stupid, because people definitely won’t pay for something they are already sceptical about.”
Reducing costs for everyone
Cost is a recurring theme in the discussion with Grönholm. During the GRX era, one of its ICE cars would cost around €350,000 to run for a season. Paddock whispers from the KymiRing suggest that EVs with their Kreisel-developed batteries were just shy of triple that. Moreover, attendees were said to be paying around €100 per person.
“Everything now is just too much money,” sighs Grönholm. “When the costs are that high for everything, what chance does it have to attract any other teams with smaller budgets, let alone compete with the likes of CE Dealer and KMS?
“If what we heard is true that tickets were around €100 for one person, then that too is crazy. We really need to bring costs down.”
A World RX comeback for GRX?
Discussing money, what, then, would it take for GRX to return as a World Rallycross outfit if it gets the green light for a 2028 comeback.
“Ay, ay, ay! You ask too many difficult questions!” Grönholm chuckles. “No, seriously, the FIA did the right thing by getting rid of the EV powertrains, because they were too expensive and the fans didn’t like them.
“As for what they will do next to make sure the cars are sustainable, I don’t know. Maybe synthetic fuels or something like in the WRC. That might work.”
Circling back to the cost-cutting aspect of things, Grönholm points to the 2027 WRC rule changes as a solid foundation for the future. These introduce a €345,000 cost cap per car and a standardised spaceframe chassis and 1.6-litre turbocharged engines shared with Rally2 to limit costs.
While yet to be confirmed, it has been rumoured that the FIA is considering allowing rallycross-adapted versions of the ‘WRC27’ cars to compete in a future World RX championship.
There’s some work to do first, though. To secure a tie-up with World RX and a possible comeback for the sport, the FIA must generate enough interest amongst teams and manufacturers for it. This means that World RX won’t be back until 2028 at the earliest.
“I think GRX returning could be possible if World RX adopts the 2027 World Rally Championship rules and allows teams to modify their cars in line with rallycross regulations, whatever they turn out to be,” Grönholm continues. “That would be a good starting point, as would keeping World RX free to view for the fans – those are two things I would like to see. 2028 is a long way down the road, though. Lots of things can happen between now and then.
‘EVs have a place in motorsport’
As for World RX’s EV era, the 57 year-old rejects calling it a “failed experiment”.
“No, I don’t think we should call electric cars in World Rallycross a failed experiment. I’m glad the FIA tried it. EVs have a place in motorsport – World RX just wasn’t the right one.”
