Rally de Portugal was awarded the "Best Rally of the World" and in 2000 the "Best Rally of the Year".[1] The most successful driver in the history of the rally is Finland's Markku Alén, who has won the event five times (1975, 1977, 1978, 1981 and 1987).
The Rally of Portugal has an important aspect which once made it so famous or maybe infamous; crowd control. During the 1970s and especially the 1980s, Portugal was known for spectators standing on the roadway even as the cars drove by, often resulting in near-collisions, and finally in the 1986 season a collision between cars and spectators. It was the last year the Group B cars domininated the WRC scene. And it was because of a tragic accident which occurred during the rally that the future of Group B cars came under scrutiny. The final blow came at the Tour de Corse later that year with the death of Henri Toivonen.
In the first section of the rally (Sintra), in the "Lagoa Azul" stage, Portuguese works Ford rally driver Joaquim Santos came over a crest in his RS200 getting too wide through the corner[citation needed]. Santos managed to avoid the crowd on the outside of the corner, but he wasn't able to avoid the crowd on the inside of the corner. The inevitable happened; the car left the road, plunging right into the crowd, killing three and injuring dozens more. After this accident all works teams withdrew from the rally.
Although it was tragic, it was also a logical result for the irresponsible behaviour of the Portuguese crowd throughout years. Additionally the speed of the Group B cars was a contributing factor[citation needed]. It was not only dangerous for the crowd, but also for the drivers themselves. Former world champion Timo Salonen admitted at the '86 edition that he was scared to run first on the road. Walter Röhrl had his own theory on the crowd situation: "You just have to see the crowd as a wall and not as spectators."
The last WRC edition of the Portugal rally for five years was run under heavy rain in 2001. It was won by Tommi Mäkinen in a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution. In 2002, it was replaced in favour of Germany's Rallye Deutschland. In 2005, the organizers of the Rally of Portugal announced their intentions to rejoin the WRC, this time switching locations to an area around the Algarve. This means the character of the rally has changed. It is fully driven on gravel these days. In 2006, it ran as an official WRC candidate event for the 2007 WRC calendar and was formally incorporated into the 2007 calendar on July 5th, 2006. The 2007 Rally Portugal was the fifth round of the season and was won by Citroën Total's Sébastien Loeb.
