PWRC regulars such as Stuart Jones, #32, Loris Baldacci, #33, Nasser Al-Attiyah, #39, Fabio Firsiero, #44 and Stepan Vojtech, #49 will skip this event as it is not one of their six nominated rounds.


Other significant entries:

Around 86 crews are due to start.

All the manufacturer teams will attend the Rally Japan and they will make up all of the entrants in World Rally Cars - with just 13 set to start.

In addition to the 16 drivers' competing for the PWRC win, another 40 or so will be entered in the Group N category - including Rally New Zealand PWRC runners, Emma Gilmour and Richard Mason.

FIA Junior Rally Championship runner-up, Urmo Aava will also be in action - competing in a Suzuki Swift Super 1600.

There will also be two runners in the A5 class, one in the A7 category, one in N3 and one in N1.


Route:

There are few changes to the route, with the rally again based in Obihiro and a central service park at Kita Aikoku, a few kilometres south.

After a city centre start ceremony on Thursday evening, the main changes have been introduced to Friday's opening leg to the north-east of the city. The opening stage of the two anti-clockwise loops is run in the opposite direction to previous years and the next two stages comprise roads not used since the rally's WRC debut in 2004.

The second leg is the longest of the rally and runs slightly further west. Both days include two passes over a short spectator test at Rikubetsu and end with two runs at a super special stage next to the service park.

The final day heads north of Obihiro and ends with a fifth pass over the super special stage.

Some of the most northerly stages have been dropped, to reduce the distance of liaison sections and to avoid the prospect of bad weather. Drivers face 27 stages covering 350.19km in a route of 1575.79km.


Last year:

Sebastien Loeb won the Rally Japan last year to take his first ever victory in 'The Land of the Rising Sun'.

Loeb took the lead on day two, after Marcus Gronholm made a mistake in SS14. The Citroen man ended proceedings on Saturday with a 25.6 second cushion – seemingly in a comfortable position. However Gronholm didn't give up and the Finn slashed that margin to 5.6 seconds at the finish, making Seb push all the way to the very end.

Mikko Hirvonen took the final place on the podium, more than 2.5 minutes off the battle for P1, while Chris Atkinson and Manfred Stohl rounded out the top five. Toshi Arai was sixth followed by Petter Solberg and Fumio Nutahara - the latter also taking the FIA Production Car WRC honours.

A number of drivers' had problems during the event, most noticeably Matthew Wilson, Luis-Perez Companc and Jari-Matti Latvala - all three though finished under the SupeRally.

Daniel Sordo came home seventh but was later excluded by the stewards for a seat-belt infraction.