According to French site PlaneteMarcus, Citroen Sport will test their upcoming World Rally Car – the Citroen DS3 WRC 1.6T – in Southern France this weekend. Sebastien Loeb will test during Thursday-Friday and Dani Sordo on Saturday-Sunday.
I guess this means that we will soon see both more photos and videos of the car during the next few days. Lovely!
Rally Sweden has finally got it’s first entries. The Citroen Total WRC team has entered, along with two privateers.
Find the list online here: http://www.rallysweden.com/wrc/en/?page_id=63
Rally Argentina’s number this year is five. It was the fifth event of the year, it was Loeb’s fifth win of the year and it was Loeb’s fifth consecutive win in Argentina. It sounds cool – but I’m afraid it’s more bad than good.
After a first day with Sordo, Latvala and Hirvonen still in the fight about the lead, Loeb went into his common leading position on Saturday and kept it for the rest of the rally. For a long time, Jari-Matti Latvala looked to take a good position after his disappointing results recently – but on the 19th stage he got some problems with the fuel pressure, making him finish the rally i 6th position. Almost the same happened to Petter Solberg, who lost his fuel pressure on the next stage dropping him out of the rally. All this meant that Loeb won followed by his team-mate Dani Sordo and with Henning Solberg on third place. However, I’m not very worried about Latvala since he managed to finish, the fault wasn’t his – and I still think he has potential to be a good driver. Malcolm Wilson will have to take this error on his account and keep his confidence in Latvala.
In P-WRC Al-Attiyah won in front of Ligato, very much taking Ligato out of the discussion of a P-WRC win, while it made Al-Attiyah highly actual for the same thing. He’s now in second place of the championship, having only Armindo Araujo ahead and having Patrik Sandell just one point behind.
I must say… Let’s hope for a more interesting result in the same rally – and hopefully a one where Loeb doesn’t win, Ford takes big points and the fight is a little bit better. The Loeb/Citroen domination is killing the WRC…
While many other teams test snow setups for Rally Norway, Citroen is back in Spain testing setups for Cyprus Rally with Daniel Sordo. A new grip is introduced in Cyprus with one day running on tarmac and two on gravel, which means gravel tyres may have to be used on tarmac. So, the Citroen test turned out quite spectacular when they tested the gravel tyres on tarmac. Of course it causes really hard tyre-wear and it gives a wide sideways driving style which is not similar to the normal driving style of tarmac rallies.
Check out a video here:
Almost at the same time as Ford were testing in Ireland – Citroen with Loeb and Sordo had already reached Catalunya where they were testing on gravel. On Tuesday and Wednesday last week Loeb was testing (borrowing Sordo’s codriver Marc Marti) – on Thursday and Friday Sordo. In the interview Daniel Sordo says that he would like to carry on climbing in the championship and finally win a rally. Also, he’s not very worried by the presence of JWRC champion Ogier in the championship, but he’s happy that Citroen carries on to support young talens – as they once did for him. This footage of the test is from channel 3 in Catalunya:
The last few days Citroen with works drivers Sebastien Loeb and Daniel Sordo have tested their cars in Monaghan, Ireland for the upcoming Rally Ireland. In an interview with BBC, Loeb says that he’s happy with the car and that the Pirellis, never previously used by the Citroen team in Ireland, feels good on the surface. Loeb also admits that he would have wanted his home rally, Rallye Monte Carlo, to start the season – but tells BBC that he must now focus on Rally Ireland, a rally he won in 2008. Maybe Loeb is spotting harder concurrence this year? At least, he admits at one point in the interview that Chris Atkinson in a C4 may increase the concurrence in the championship. This seems quite logical, since the loss of Subaru and Suzuki certainly doesn’t change the fight about the top places – both teams have struggled to even get to the finish the last year(s).
This nice video by Enda Healy shows a few of the rounds done by Daniel Sordo in the test:
Despite the fact that the M1 entry time has closed for the WRC silly season is going on at it’s best. I made a quick list of entries (as far as I know) that will do at least one and probably more than one rally in the WRC 2009. However, I’m sure this list is far from complete, and some facts may be incorrect, so please make it better by adding what you know in the comments. I’ll try to update the list based on your comments as good as I can.
WRC entries
Mikko Hirvonen / Jarmo Lehtinen, Ford Focus WRC, 12 rallies
Jari-Matti Latvala / Miika Anttila, Ford Focus WRC, 12 rallies
Khalid Al-Quassimi / Michael Orr (?), Ford Focus WRC, 6 rallies
Matthew Wilson / Scott Martin, Ford Focus WRC, 12 rallies
Henning Solberg / Cato Menkerud, Ford Focus WRC, 12 rallies
Urmo Aava / Kuldar Sikk, Ford Focus WRC, 8 rallies
Federico Villagra / Jorge Perez Companc (?), Ford Focus WRC, 8 rallies
2nd Munchis – various drivers / ?, Ford Focus WRC, 8 rallies
Peter van Merksteijn / Erwin Berkhof, Ford Focus WRC, 8 rallies
Peter van Merksteijn Jr / Eddy Chevalier, Ford Focus WRC, 8 rallies
Sebastien Loeb / Daniel Elena, Citroen C4 WRC, 12 rallies
Daniel Sordo / Marc Marti, Citroen C4 WRC, 12 rallies
Conrad Rautenbach / Daniel Barritt, Citroen C4 WRC, 12 rallies
Sebastien Ogier / Julien Ingrassia, Citroen C4 WRC, 6 rallies
Evgeny Novikov / Dale Moscatt, Citroen C4 WRC, 8 rallies
Chris Atkinson / Stephane Prevot, Citroen C4 WRC, at least 1 rally
Mads Östberg / Ole Kristian Unnerud, Subaru Impreza WRC, 8 rallies
So, I think that was it… Don’t beat me if I’m wrong or if I’m missing something. Just tell me in the comments, and if you can; add a source link. I’ll try to keep this list updated as good as possible.
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