Difficulty Setting: Currently experiencing with the AI set to 95 but was also having the same issue when the AI was set to 90 and 100
Stage: Any
Career: Any career event that goes over 4 stages
Time of Day: All
Weather Condition: Wasn't paying attention but I assume all
Vehicle Class: All
The number one trigger that I have for the AI inconsistencies is any rally that has more than 4 stages. If I go to the 5th stage on any rally at any location in any car then without fail I will beat the AI by 2 minutes plus. I have included a screenshot of the most recent occurrence which happened in a custom rally I created for Finland in the WRC 2017-2021 class. On the previous 4 stages in this event I was consistently placing between 5th and 10th about 10-30 seconds behind the leader, so there is really no reason that I should beat the entire field by 2 and a half minutes on a relatively short stage. (95 AI difficulty)
Unlike others in this thread I do not experience this bug when quitting a rally and then restarting it later. If I play a rally event in one sitting without ever closing the game I still get this bug once I get to the 5th stage. Occasionally the bug will start on the 4th stage but recently it has been very consistently the 5th stage when it starts.