Archive for the ‘Rally testing’ Category
Monday, February 8th, 2010
PG Andersson's car at today's test. Photo: pgandersson.se
As the header says, a lot of last minute testing is going on for Rally Sweden… On the list is local ace P-A Sääv that will do the rally in his privately owned and newly bought Skoda Fabia Super2000. Together with him, PG Andersson will do tests with his Skoda Fabia Super2000 that has now arrived in Sweden. At the same time as PG and Sääv is testing their Fabias, Patrik Sandell is doing tests with the Red Bull Rally Team today over in Norway…
PG Andersson's car without stripes in the garage after arrival.
Tags: norway, pa sääv, patrik sandell, per-arne sääv, pg andersson, rally sweden, red bull rally, s2000, skoda fabia super2000
Posted in Rally testing, S-WRC / WRC Cup | No Comments »
Monday, February 8th, 2010
Andreas Mikkelsen's test place in Kall, Sweden a few days ago when Marcus Grönholm was testing the car. Today, Monday, it's Andreas' turn to do the testing. Photo: andreasmikkelsen.no
It seems like Andreas Mikkelsen has decided that he will use the Ford Fiesta Super2000 for this years campaign (source: Verdens Gang) in the Intercontinental Rally Challenge. Earlier, I have reported that Mikkelsen was still in the choice between the Fiesta and the Skoda Fabia Super2000 – a decisiong that now has been made.
First off and as we already know, Andreas will do Sweden in the Fiesta. Then he will follow up with a seven round programme in the IRC with the hope to go back to the World Rally Championship in 2011.
Mikkelsen’s manager, Erik Veiby, says:
- We have been working purposefully to get Andreas and Ola in a competitive car, and a team that can win the IRC series this year.
We’ll see if that’s correct…
Tags: andreas mikkelsen, erik veiby, ford fiesta super2000, intercontinental rally challenge, IRC, rally sweden, s2000, skoda fabia super2000
Posted in IRC, Rally testing, Silly season, WRC | No Comments »
Monday, February 8th, 2010
Petter Solberg's car during service while testing in Sweden on Sunday. Photo: PSWRT
Petter Solberg, who has previously done both tests and a few test rallys (Svully Rally Dahbi in Norway and Finnskogsvalsen in Sweden) during the recent weeks, tested his Citroën C4WRC in Sweden once again yesterday. In a short post on his blog Petter said that driving the car was good fun and that it’s really fast. Today Petter is probably checking in for the rally and tomorrow starts the recce that will take place during Tuesday and Wednesday.
Tags: 2010, citroen c4wrc, finnskogsvalsen, petter solberg, phil mills, rally sweden, svully rally dahbi, test, testing
Posted in Rally testing, WRC | No Comments »
Sunday, February 7th, 2010
Our friend Sebastien Loeb has commited two day’s of testing in Gräsmark outside Torsby in Sweden. The test has gone well, but most interesting is that Loeb did give something that we can probably consider the final confirmation that he is never happy. Despite maybe half a meter of snow (that has been there constantly for the last two months) and temperatures as well as forecasts well below zero, Loeb spent half his talk with the Swedish television (this may be edited, sure, but still!) complaining about the lack of ice under the snow. He didn’t like plenty of snow and he didn’t like reaching the frozen gravel under all snow…
Come on, how should one react? “Oh, poor Sebastien.” 
Can’t you drive on real snow? Hehe… I think this underlines quite well that it doesn’t matter how the conditions are – people will still complain. Probably it’s just a smart way of not having to speak about your performance just before the rally – and save that until after. I respect that it happens, but one shouldn’t take too much notice of it…
Tags: conditions, frozen, gravel, ice, rally sweden, sebastien loeb, snow
Posted in Rally testing, WRC | 2 Comments »
Friday, February 5th, 2010
World rally champion Sebastien Loeb warmed up for Rally Sweden yesterday by testing in northern Värmland. Loeb did a full day test arranged by Citroen and former Citroën driver Thomas Rådström. At the afternoon, even Kimi Räikkönen showed up and did two rounds with Sebastien in the co-driver seat of the car. However, Kimi was there as a private person and didn’t do any tests himself.
Source: VF
Tags: citroen c4wrc, kimi räikkönen, sebastien loeb, sweden, test, thomas rådström, värmland
Posted in Rally testing, WRC | 2 Comments »
Thursday, February 4th, 2010
This is a bit old news (a few days, at least) – but it feels like my duty to post it. Better late than never. A video by ExtremRallye from the Citroën DS3 WRC test with Sebastien Loeb in France earlier this month. The car looks wonderful – don’t it?
The car spec’s are the following:
- Restricted motor from C4 WRC
- Sadev differentials and gearbox
- BOS dampers
Posted in Rally testing, Video, WRC | No Comments »
Saturday, January 30th, 2010
There are a whole bunch of videos from Kimi Räikkönen’s drive in Arctic Rally Lapland 2010. Here are a few…
Kimi Räikkönen, day 1:
Kimi Räikkönen, day 2:
Kimi Räikkönen, on-board showing Kimi’s C4WRC after his accident on SS2:
Thanks to Ludtati for all the videos.
Tags: 2010, arctic rally, citroen c4wrc, kimi räikkönen, lapland, rally, test, Video, youtube
Posted in National Rallying, Rally testing, Video, WRC | 8 Comments »
Saturday, January 30th, 2010
Räikkönen went off already on the second special stage in the Arctic Lapland Rally in Finland yesterday. Despite that, it was quite an impressive competitive debut in Citroen C4 WRC for the former Formula 1 driver. He set second fastest time already on the first special stage, and continued to post competitive times throughout the weekend, after getting back from the SS2 ditch with a big delay and time penalty.
Räikkönen’s experienced co-driver Kaj Lindström commented after SS9 that the difference to Sordo was 0.9 seconds per kilometer, and at the same time stated that the duo knew they were going slowed than they could – partly because the car setting still wasn’t 100% adapted to Räikkönen’s preferences. Even Kimi himself said at the that he didn’t think it would be very difficult to drive faster, since he knew that the car wasn’t really as he wanted it to be.
Personally, I think Räikkönen got a good and really impressive start. An early off was probably just good for him, since that showed him exactly were the limit was and it also took the overall placement totally off his shoulders. With nothing to fight for in the rally, Kimi could put his focus just on improving his own driving and the car while still having the possibility to compare himself to others, stage by stage.
What I doubt a little bit more is the easiness of going faster. Kimi seems perfectly comfortable by being slower as he knows it’s “the car settings’ fault”. That’s probably perfectly true, but that’s also half the challenge in rallying. You must get a good setup of the car that works from stage to stage. Of course F1 is also much about fine tuning of car settings, but the conditions there are often a little bit more stable. In rallying you’re driving for a longer time and over longer distances, and conditions may vary much or extremely much (Rally Monte Carlo is the perfect example). That’s a part of the challenge and shouldn’t be underestimated.
However, to sum it up I’m really impressed by Kimi’s performance – and it will be a big pleasure to see his developments throughout the season. Go Kimi!
Tags: 2010, accident, arctic rally, arctic rally lapland, car, citroen c4 wrc, dani sordo, formula 1, kimi räikkönen, off road, settings
Posted in National Rallying, Rally testing | 1 Comment »
Saturday, January 30th, 2010
Petter Solberg on the start ramp of Svully Rally Dahbi today. Photo: PSWRT
The Norweigan Svully Rally Dahbi were ran today, and as expected Petter Solberg won the rally with a huge margin to second placed Marcus Grönholm. However, as the rally primarily was an interesting test for the upcoming Rally Sweden – some things were more interesting than the end results:
- Solberg, who sealed a sponsorship agreement with energy drink Mad-Croc earlier this week, were happy with the car and had adjusted settings that made him even more comfortable with the Citroen C4 WRC than last weekend in Sweden.
- Marcus Grönholm won the fight over both Mikkelsen and Sandell – all running in Subaru Impreza group N cars, were Grönholm had the oldest one of them. However, the battle between Mikkelsen and Sandell were quite close despite Mikkelsen being the one most used to his car. That is interesting since Mikkelsen is often considered more of a “raw talent” than Sandell.
- Swedish young shot Pontus Tidemand were impressive managing to keep up the speed with Patrik Sandell and finishing just 1.2 secs behind. There you can talk about a raw talent, and I’d be surprised if we don’t see Pontus in the international arena within a few years!
Tags: 2010, andreas mikkelsen, citroen c4wrc, marcus grönholm, patrik sandell, petter solberg, pontus tidemand, rally sweden, subaru impreza, svulla rally dahbi
Posted in National Rallying, Rally testing, WRC | No Comments »
Thursday, January 28th, 2010
The Svully Rally Dahbi in Norway this weekend will be one of the main events for many drivers in their testing for Rally Sweden. With extremely short transport distances compared to the amount of SS the event will be cheap and effective – and with the key people from Rally Norway’s organisation in the lead, such a rally is almost a given success. Among the entries are Petter Solberg, Henning Solberg, Marcus Grönholm, Patrik Sandell and Andreas Mikkelsen.
A strange thing though is that PG Andersson has been named as an entrant in many places, including on http://www.svullyrallydahbi.no, that seems like the rally’s official website. However, PG has told Swedish media that he will be a zero car driver in Swedish Bergslagsrallyt the very same day, that he will not start in Norway and that he has never entered the event (and don’t know why he has been named as an entrant). Strange?!?!
It will be nice to see how the event will be when it’s run. And while we’re waiting for that to happen, I’ll keep on wondering about the owners of the rally. Dahbi makes me think of Abu Dhabi, a name that has been appearing often in the World Rally Championship since a few years. And through a few questions on Google, you can find out that there is a British company registered in London called “Svully Rally Dahbi Limited”. And, if I don’t get it totally wrong (which I may do…) – this British company owns 100% of the stocks in a Norweigan company, led by Even Wiger (m.d. of Rally Norway), with the very same name. It’s not a big thing, but I just wonder why there is a company registered in the UK at all, if the owners would be just Norweigans?! Since I love to speculate, I now guess that some other guys are involved in this as owners, potentially some rich men from Abu Dhabi… However, if so – one question remains. Why can’t they spell Dahbi correct? That seems quite embarassing…
End of speculation. Over and out!
Tags: abu dhabi, andreas mikkelsen, bergslagsrallyt, british, henning solberg, ltd, marcus grönholm, patrik sandell, petter solberg, pg andersson, svully rally dahbi, svully rally dahbi limited, svully rally dhabi, uk, united kingdom
Posted in General, General rallying, National Rallying, Rally testing, WRC | No Comments »
