Markku Alén

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Markku Alén
World Rally Championship record
Nationality	Finnish
Active years	1973 - 1993, 2002
Teams	Fiat, Lancia, Subaru, Toyota
World rallies	129
Championships	1 (1978)
Wins	19
Podium finishes	56
Stage wins	774
Points	840
First world rally	1973 1000 Lakes Rally
First win	1975 Rally Portugal
Last win	1988 RAC Rally
Last world rally	2001 Neste Rally Finland
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Markku Alén (born February 15, 1951 in Helsinki) is a rally and race car driver born in Finland. He holds the record for most stage wins in the World Rally Championship.

Alén is one of the most successful rally drivers in the history of rallying and one of the famous Flying Finns. Markku started his rallying career in 1969 driving a Renault 8 Gordini. Since then he went on to drive with Volvo, Fiat, Lancia, Subaru, Toyota and Ford. He managed 19 consecutive WRC wins in his career.

Before the World Rally Championship for Drivers was established in 1979, Alén won the FIA Cup for Drivers in 1978, driving mainly for the Fiat works team.

Following a move to the Lancia factory team which brought continued success, Alén narrowly lost the 1986 World Rally Championship to rival driver Juha Kankkunen. Late in the season, Alén had been victorious on the San Remo rally only after Kankkunen's Peugeot team was excluded by the organizers on a controversial technicality. Peugeot subsequently appealed the exclusion to the FISA, which eventually annulled the results of the rally, stripping Alén of the World Championship title which he had held for just 11 days.

He drove two races of the International Touring Car Championship of 1995 for Alfa Romeo, driving the same number of races in DTM earlier that year. He also drove in Trophy Andros in 1996 and 1997.

To celebrate his 50th birthday in 2001, he entered that year's Neste Rally Finland, finishing in a respectable 16th place overall with a Ford Focus WRC.