What surface type is used for Rally Sweden?

Rally Sweden uses snow and ice as its defining surface type. It is traditionally the World Rally Championship’s only rally run on snow, with competitors racing on frozen roads in central and northern Sweden.

The event began in 1950 as the Rally to the Midnight Sun, a summer competition. It joined the WRC calendar in 1973 and later became internationally famous for its winter conditions. In 2022, the rally moved its base from the Värmland region to Umeå in Västerbotten, farther north, to improve the chances of reliable snow and ice.

The roads are technically gravel roads beneath the winter coating. Special studded tyres bite into the ice and allow remarkable cornering speeds, while snowbanks can help guide cars through turns. This is why “gravel” can appear in technical descriptions, but snow and ice is the canonical quiz answer for the rally’s characteristic surface.

A common mix-up is Rallye Monte-Carlo, which may also encounter snow or ice in the mountains, but it is primarily an asphalt event with changeable conditions.