With the Subaru works team, Solberg finished runner-up to Marcus Grönholm in 2002 and then became the first Norwegian to win the drivers' world title in 2003.

Solberg won a nationwide RC car championship the Norwegian Tamiya Cup in 1987 at the age of 13 as he inherited his interest of motorsport through his parents, mother Tove and father Terje, who were keen bilcross (an "inexpensive version" of Norwegian rallycross, similar to Swedish folkrace and Finnish jokamiehenluokka) competitors and rallycross enthusiasts.

Initially expected by Malcolm Wilson to maintain a somewhat lower profile, Solberg actually became a nominated points-scorer for Ford on, of all events, the gruelling test that was the Safari Rally in early 1999, after usual understudy to the team's star driver Colin McRae, Thomas Rådström, suffered an injury and was subsequently ruled out from taking part.

In 2000 however, Solberg was able to leave Ford's M-Sport outfit prematurely, due to an insufficient contract, to sign with the Subaru World Rally Team (SWRT), then led by a driving staff of Richard Burns and Juha Kankkunen.

His first podium had to wait until the Acropolis Rally, Greece the following year, as an altruistic Solberg forsook as many of his own points as possible, as he did in dropping voluntarily from 4th to 5th in Corsica, to assist his senior teammate Burns in sneaking to the title.

In 2003 Solberg entered the final event, the Wales Rally GB, with himself, Citroën-mounted Sébastien Loeb and Burns in contention for the title.

Burns withdrew before the event for health reasons and Solberg finished ahead of Loeb, launching him to his second win in Wales and his first and only World Rally Championship title.

He was, however, soon overtaken by a rampant Loeb, and was left to score 71 points for the year, pipping Peugeot's Marcus Grönholm to the championship runner-up spot on a tie break.

He added an unwanted Wales Rally GB win after the death in a day three crash of fellow competitor Markko Märtin's co-driver, Michael Park, with Loeb sacrificing his victory on the road in order to avoid having to simultaneously celebrate the title.

Failure to claw his way any higher than sixth in the year's final points standings duly brought an end to the chain of top three drivers' championship appearances which Subaru had enjoyed since 1994.

He surrendered a potential third-place finish in Sweden after a substantial time loss,[4] as well as being bested by his brother, Henning, in the race for the final podium place on the siblings' home event – Rally Norway.

[5] In Mexico, Argentina and Sardinia Solberg struggled with his Impreza — technical problems caused two retirements and a plummet down the leaderboard in Italy.

[6][7][8] Good pace in Portugal[9] and taking third place on the Acropolis Rally at least appeared to mark a turnaround in the quality of the younger Solberg's results, although even Greek event wasn't problem-free for the Norwegian as he experienced some damper problems.

[10] Despite Subaru's confidence in their car performance and reliability built up during summer break tests,[11] Impreza S12A failed again — Solberg had to retire on day two in Finland, after monstrous handling and steering problems which the engineers were unable to deal with.

[12][13] On the next round, Rallye Deutschland, where he finished sixth, the car by itself was reliable, but the Norwegian hit a rock on SS5 heavily damaging the steering, which had cost him considerable amount of time because the team wasn't able to fully repair it.

[16] Unfortunately for the Norwegian, the setup wasn't as good and he had problems with handling again which, along with a stalled engine on the start of SS5,[17] resulted in a disappointing fifth place, behind young Finn Jari-Matti Latvala.

[18] In Japan, his team's home event, Solberg clocked several top-ten times on the early stages, but crashed badly on SS5 then, probably due to damage sustained in accident, his gearbox locked in sixth gear, forcing his retirement for the day.

[20] On the final event of the season, Wales Rally GB, Solberg had consistent pace and won the battle for fourth with Spaniard Dani Sordo even though the Norwegian hit a rock in the morning and again had some minor handling issues.

Solberg started his season with a fifth place in Monte Carlo and fourth in Sweden, but went on to retire or finish outside point-scoring positions in the following four events.

A radical new hatchback homologation of the long-serving Subaru Impreza, the WRC2008, debuted on the Acropolis Rally, marked by the Norwegian collecting a runner-up spot to Sébastien Loeb.

It took some time to adapt to the new car during their first round in Norway, but eventually Solberg and Mills managed to secure a sixth place and three points in the drivers' championship.

Solberg sat a fastest stage time here by 1.4 sec which secured the 2nd place podium finish, marking the best result by PSWRT to date.

Ogier was sacrificed in a new level of tactics, sending him out as first car as road sweeper for Loeb, while receiving penalties and losing his good position.

With several stages canceled on safety reasons due to too much mud, and later a scary meet with a tree on the slippery conditions, Solberg wisely stopped fighting and conceded to secure the 2nd place.

But for the final 30 km stage of the rally, four drivers were within 18 seconds of the lead, which led to an epic four-way battle for the victory, between Ogier, Latvala, Solberg and Loeb.

Ogier and Loeb both had a spin that cost them some seconds, and Solberg going too fast around a high speed bend hit a telegraph pole on the road shoulder and retired from 3rd position.

[33] In February, Solberg had his driving licence suspended in Sweden after police caught him travelling 32 km/h above the speed limit on the way to the fifth stage of the country's WRC round, forcing co-driver Chris Patterson to take up the wheel.

In 2013 Solberg changed discipline, competing in all nine rounds of the FIA European Rallycross Championship (ERX) with his own team, based in Torsby.

Since then Petter has been a constant and supportive presence in his son's life as Oliver Solberg followed in his father's footsteps and reached the World Rally Championship.

Pernilla is the daughter of former Volvo factory driver and 1980 European Rallycross Champion, Per-Inge Walfridsson (who also claimed a remarkable fourth overall in the 1973 RAC Rally).