Last year Sami Pajari had a head-on crash in the middle of a rally. During his championship season he was beaten up. That’s why his calmness is surprising.
*The interviews for this story were conducted before the fatal test crash of rally driver Craig Breen.*
The asphalt road, coloured by brown leaves, flashes before your eyes. The sharp bends follow one another in an unbroken chain.
The road is deceptively narrow. A mirror on the outside of the right-hand bend tells you that. Use the mirror to check that no one is driving around the bend at the same time.
Or you could check if the speed was in accordance with the speed limit on the road.
What Pajari doesn’t know is that every motorist’s worst nightmare awaits him around the bend.
The spark to the rally
He talks about his son Sam’s first steps behind the wheel. You could run about 150 meters on the yard road of Pajarite with the ugly yard truck.
– Sam first had to put blocks on the pedals so that he could reach to press the brake and clutch, Pertti Pajari describes.
The rally family is a fitting image of Pajari. Sami and his older brother, two years older, were already like pawns in the garage and in the maintenance pits. Rally videos beat children’s programs in screen time.
It’s no wonder that Sami Pajar has always had the spark for rallying inside him.
– I never decided that I wanted to follow the rally or try it. It has always been a given. I haven’t really done anything else seriously, Sami Pajari describes.
There was no reason to put out the boys’ passion for driving, even though Pertti’s father knew from experience where free time and extra money would go in the future. Dad’s historic class Volvo left the garage to enable the boys’ hobby.
Then the rallying spark of 15-year-old Sami Pajar quickly went up in flames. The passion for driving was also accompanied by the desire to compete.
The star of the future
Sami Pajari is one of the competitors from whom AKK, the umbrella organization of Finnish motorsport, is training the next star of the future. As a reward, you would expect a fully funded competition at the Jyväskylä World Rally Championship in the summer of 2019. Markkula himself is on the selection board of the competition, evaluating notation skills.
He has rarely, if ever, heard such a story from the mouth of a young driver.
– He clearly stood out in terms of his analytical skills and the way he approaches preparation for a big competition and notation. Sami had already worked for several years for it, even though he didn’t even have a driver’s license yet, Markkula recalls afterwards.
– As a person, Sami is calm and thoughtful. He thinks about things very carefully and from many angles. Sometimes it even goes too far, but yes, it is also a good feature in elite sports that you make choices through reflection, Hara thinks.
During the rally, there is no place for extra thinking. Therefore, during the competition weeks, Pajar also reveals other features.
Latvalaa in nature
– Very calm and very determined. Sami keeps his own head when necessary, Pajar map reader Enni Mälkönen describes.
It is worth paying attention to Karttur’s words, because one could suddenly imagine a calm and reflective nature leading to a chase. This is not the case with Pajar.
Many features connect Pajar and former top driver Latvala. Like Latvala, Pajari is described as basically polite and listening. Pajari also exudes a Latvala-like interest in the history of the sport.
After his career, Latvala has described his tendency to overanalyze as one of his biggest shortcomings, which could lead to bad tire choices as well as unnecessary changes to the car’s settings.
Pajarin is not said to fall into this, but decisions are born and stick.
One of the most special decisions is related to preparing for special exams. Pajari doesn’t stare at incar videos late at night, unlike many other drivers.
– Because some are definitely looking for even more self-confidence. I personally try to maximize my sleeping time. During a rally, six hours of sleep is a good amount. I don’t want to sacrifice a couple of hours for videos, Pajari explains.
According to Pajar, each driver works in the way that suits him best. However, Pajar’s decision shows strong self-confidence. He agrees with the fact that others tap more videos during the rally week.
Pajari believes in his own method of operation: preparations are made carefully, but before the rally. After that, he relies a lot on his road memory, which he has, at least without realizing it, been trained by practicing musical notes in his youth at the wheel of a moped.
But what word would sum up Pajar as a driver?
– Fast, really fast, karttur Mälkönen answers without a moment’s thought.
– When he is compared to others who drove the same races with the same equipment, Pajari has always been the driver who has been able to regularly drive low times, Haapamäki characterizes.
One pothole away from a collision
Pajari drove the most special class bases of his career last November in the Japan World Rally Championship. He was given the best quote for the clip, which was inserted in the middle of everything. The Finn’s calculated time was the best of the bunch.
What makes the case even more special is that Pajarin was partly the reason for stopping the clip. He had pressed the emergency button in the car.
For some reason, Pajari and Mälkönen didn’t end up pressing the button.
Every motorist’s worst nightmare is a car that is driving against the same lane. Pajari and Mälkönen encountered this in the middle of a rally competition and its special test closed to road traffic.
There is a video of the event shot from several angles, but it has never been released by the promoter of the series.
Pajari, sitting in a harbor cafe in Lahti, gets a video to watch on his phone. However, he wouldn’t need that, because the situation is understandably memorable.
– It’s good that there are no voices here. A few unprintable words might have come out of the mouth, Pajari smiles.
In the video, you can see how the road curves sharply to the left behind a small bump. A white passenger car appears in Pajar’s field of vision at the last moment in the middle of a bend. Pajari makes a sharp correction move and passes the car at almost a hundred without even flinching at the speed.
The luck of the driver who got lost on the route was that a rally driver with his senses tuned to the extreme was responsible for dodging.
– That should never happen. On the other hand, in a rally you have to be really sharp all the time due to various variables. It is not unheard of for a moose to jump onto the road in the middle of everything, Pajari reminds.
A dark moment in the championship season
Outside, the freezing snow crunches underfoot, as is the nature of a crisp winter day. The sound also indicates that Sami Pajar has a new flow in his step. The steps lead to an important meeting.
Due to his life situation, the rally professional can’t take his own dog, but luckily the furry friends of the partners keep the worst dog fever down at regular intervals.
Pian Pajar has a leash in his hand, on the end of which a one-year-old Pena dog is darting from bench to bench.
Four-legged people bring a suitable counterbalance to Pajar’s life, as do loved ones and friends.
There was a need for all kinds of support in the 2021 championship season. However, the results do not indicate this. The winning streak that started with the EC rally in June also moved to the World Cup rallies and at the end of the year it was time to celebrate the championship.
However, outsiders did not know what else had been included in the season. In June, in the middle of the competition season, he had been abused.
There has been news about the abuse, but Pajari himself has not wanted to open up the matter much in public. He just happened to be there at the wrong time.
– The makers didn’t know who I was. I have thought about it in the way that it was an isolated case that I had to deal with. I would use it as an example that anything and everything can happen in life that you cannot influence. You still just have to make an effort to move forward.
This was Pajarinki’s task. Rally professionalism did not wait.
– A day later I had to pack my suitcase again and go to the rally. It wasn’t a bad feeling, but you had to push yourself even harder.
Pajari packed his bags, traveled to Poland and a week later celebrated his first class win at EC level.
Pajari talks about difficult moments calmly and consistently. It is easy to look for similarities in his words and character throughout his career.
Not the new Rovanperä
At Pajar, the background team has had a clear plan year after year about what level and equipment to compete with during the year. According to expert Henri Haapamäki, it is easier to achieve top results when the future is not dependent on one competition.
– It’s the only right style. The old way of thinking, that if you drive for a top result, then you will find the funding, usually does not go far, Haapamäki reminds.
This season, Pajari will drive the WRC2 series in the colors of Toksport with the latest Skoda Rally2 car. The team has the solid support of Skoda behind them, even though the car brand no longer has an official factory garage.
In Markkula’s opinion, Pajari and his background team are on the right path.
– Building a career has been controlled – or at least as controlled as it can be with the sums of money required by the rally. The endpoint is not yet visible. I believe that Sami will reach exactly as far as he can just try, Markkula estimates.
Enduring is a surprisingly appropriate choice of words. There will be no new Kalle Rovanperä from Pajar. After all, the reigning world champion is only a year older than Pajari. It is certain that Pajar’s road to factory driver – not to mention world champion – is longer than Rovanpera’s, perhaps rockier.
Pajari is not afraid to admit that his current profession also includes these difficult moments.
The reference point of a rally professional aiming for the highest peak can be sought from a hybrid of a top athlete and a growth entrepreneur. Travel days, cooperation patterns, tests and competitions consume regardless of passion.
On the long road, however, the spark left burning under the chest as a child will help you cope.
– I’m not tired of that yet, Pajari says.
The gaze lingers for a moment on the snow-covered lake in the harbor of Lahti.
– When you return home, it’s great to be able to go on the ice rink with a rear-wheel drive on a long slide.