Now, even Rally NZ seems to have understood the truth. Chris Carr, chairman of the rally, says that “it’s always fire behind the smoke you see”. Interesting enough, Neil Allport, former NZ Rally Champion, says that lack of money is behind the decision and that the government should put the adequate money in. Strange, since NZ from what I know always have been backed by nothing else than a loooot of government money… However, I can understand they’re disappointed – and I am too. NZ is a traditional rally with wonderful views and an exotic kind of environment… The thing is probably that their market is too small.

The big fail in this discussion may be Rally Norway. They’ve made two good rallies – but they’ve also done mistakes. They have overestimated themselves big time (and that’s their biggest mistake if you ask me). I remember their plans for 2007 that I once got presented – and it was utopia. They had got quite a lot of government money, but they also calculated huge incomes from spectators, sponsoring, etc.The figures was almost 10 times the corresponding numbers of Rally Sweden. Norway did all kinds of extravagancies that year, and of course they blew it totally from a financial point of view – no matter any government money. From what I know, they lowered their calculations drastically for their next event, but obviously not enough. There was less delight of the news from the public in Norway in 2009, and the reports I got from competitors in the rally was that there was really few spectators.

No matter the economics, you can’t take from the Norweigans that they have arranged two really good events – with the media coverage in the 2007 event being my favourite point. Their problem now is unstable economy, the fact that they’re not a traditional event and the fact that they’re running on snow. But maybe even management!? They have always been so overconfident. Now it seems like their managers expected Norway to be first reserve for 2011 – but according to the latest news Poland (that has been completely silent so far!) is the first reserve. Erik Veiby, chairman of the Rally Norway board, says this is just speculations and of course it is, but honestly… I agree that nothing is decided and that things can for sure change – but it’s obvious to everyone that Rally Norway is now in deep shit. I bet that (no matter what Erik Veiby says!) they are now working hard with lobbying on all kind of levels and trying to get to know why they’re out of the calendar and how they can change it.

The approach from organisers struggling to find the grip needed to stay in the calendar is starting to look like an interesting game. The silly thing is that all this started a few years ago with the FIA letting people “buy” candidate events to the left and right by just paying a big fee to them (read more in my post on the rotation system from last year). After the organisers have paid those fees, they of course expected to get an event for it! So, FIA made this stupid rotating calendar and everyone got their events. Now, they have realized the obvious – that it doesn’t work. And many of the payers (and some others) stand there without their events again like they never had one… It’s stupid multiplied by a thousand.

No matter what, I’m looking forward to see how this game continues – and I hope (but doubt – Abu Dhabi on special built roads, come on!?!) it ends up with the best events!

Seeing Mikkelsen in the Fabia would be really interesting. After Mikkelsens extremely good times in his group N Subaru in Norway fighting with Sandell, he seems to me like the optimal opponent to measure Sandell.

The question now is just what the deal depends on, more than the traditional show-stopper: money. I know that Skoda have had problems to deliver enough Fabia Super2000s to meet all requests – but I think Mr. Baumschlager (Red Bull team boss) have the best possible priority there. Let’s just hope to see Mikkelsen/Floene in the Fabia – that would be awesome!

- It was less spectators than we had expected during Rally Norway. We are a little bit disappointed by that. It was a cold weekend, and it may be the low temperatures that kept many people at home.

According to the site, the pre-event sales on the web was lower than before the 2007 event – and Sponsor Link (Rally Norway’s hospitality partner) and the Olympia Park arena in Lillehammer both report losses around 0,5 million NOK (ca 57 000€) each.

Rally Norway hasn’t published any official figures yet (those are quite soon to come, according to Wiger), but considering the huge loss after the 2007 event and substantially stricter economy planning this year’s even I can’t avoid thinking: Was this the last Rally Norway?

Rally Norway was on thin ice already after 2007 when the event ended up way off the budget, and it wont get easier with more red figures – if they come. As I’ve already pointed out, Rally Norway’s situation is close to the one over here in Sweden… Crisis.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I called PG on Thursday this week, when he was back home in Sweden – and he seemed happy with his result:

- It went really well as long as it lasted, better than we could ever imagine. We intended to be fifth or sixth in the end and hoped to set some medium-good stagetimes, but we didn’t even dream about two stage wins.

So, what was behind this super-performance? Rumours talk about a Czech mechanic making some kind of dream changes on PG’s car in the service before the second loop of the day, but PG play down the importance of any changes made. He was instead worried going into the second loop, since everyone expected the late runners in the field to have a good advantage over Loeb, Hirvonen and the other early starters in the morning loop – something that didn’t happen. This meant, PG feared being beaten even more going into the afternoon:

- We made a few small changes in the setup in the mid-day break. A small change on the timing in the gear-switch and a few clicks on the rear dampers – but that was in fact just because I had to put in two spare wheels. The big difference was that the surface seemed to match the car better in the second loop and I felt more comfortable. I had started to trust Anders (Fredriksson, stand-in co-driver) totally and I attacked more, keeping better lines and getting more flow.

So, what happened making you have to retire? People have talked about you being off prior to the retirement…

- The clutch broke down, but it had nothing to do with an off. I just touched a snow-bank a while before, but that was on the right hand side and the clutch is to the left, those things had nothing to do with each other. The surroundings of the clutch keeping it in place on the gearbox broke -  even though it was made of titanium! It worked for a short while but then the whole clutch broke out of the axis, and it was finished… Actually we still don’t really know why.

Was it a big disappointment?

- For sure it was a disappointment to retire, but fact is that we had already achieved the most important – the stage wins. Even if we would have finished fifth or sixth, the talk would be about the stage wins – not the final result.

Going into the rally PG told me that after this event all his money was spent, and that he had no further plans. The sad reality have been shown too many times now, that good performances doesn’t at all have to pay off in the WRC of today. So, even though I was pessimistic – I couldn’t wait to ask PG if any new offers had came:

- Team bosses aren’t really chasing with paper and pencil to sign their contracts and there’s no point in even listening to those ones wanting millions from me to drive. But of course it’s better as it is now, to have showed my name in the top. Maybe the world will change and get a little bit more attractive to drivers, and then I’m there. The situation is much better than sitting at home being ice cold on the market…

So, there are no plans for the future?

- Actually Kongsrud (Bernhard Kongsrud, owner of the Fabia) wants me to drive in the Numedalsrallyt running the 7th of March in Norway. So as it looks now, I may be there with the Skoda!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks to StormcastProductions.

Will arranging the Swedish Rally in the summer make the WRC better? At least it's easier to spectate a rally in the summer, allowing for better income to the organiser.

Here’s some background:

A few days ago I talked to a friend regarding the Swedish Rally. He had a great idea – to make the event a summer rally. Of course it’s not a new idea at all – I’ve heard it dozens of times, but for the first time it really makes sense. The idea is based on the fact that weather conditions are a problem to the rally – and that a few events next year (for example Indonesia) wants to get out of the championship. So, with summer events wanting to get out of the calendar, when Rally Norway that shines in meters of snow, and when Mikko Hirvonen sees no reason why Norway shouldn’t have a slot every year – why not include the excellent Rally Norway even next year (article in Norweigan here), and make the Swedish Rally with it’s excellent organisation arrange a summer round in the championship?

Here’s why it makes sense:

• First off, it’s impossible to fight the weather. Either the Swedish event would have to be changed to a snow/gravel mix, it would have to be moved, or it would have to be removed from the calendar. I don’t believe in snow/gravel, I think a move would mean losing big parts of the competence, and I don’t think that it’s a good option for the WRC to lose one of their best organisers – so… Remains to switch to a summer competition.
• Making the rally a summer event would preserve a fantastic organisation and allow for an already experienced organisation to take new steps and do a new event from scratch, allowing for much creativity to go into the event that could develop the WRC in a positive way.
• Summer rallies are in many ways easier and more cost-effective to arrange, where spectators and VIPs can easier get into the stages, facilities can be hosted in simple tents and snow ploughs doesn’t need to be used for every single parking spot. This would allow for the Swedish organisation to get back on feet economically.
• A summer rally would also mean having a rally later in the year than a winter round, which would give the organisation a little more time to improve their economy and also to prepare the switch.
• It would solve a part of the problems with the organisers wanting to cancel their WRC rounds, and make the calendar for next year closer to complete than it is currently.

Of course, it may be a problem having already having so much gravel events that Finland has a summer event on gravel, but for short, I just think it’s better to arrange a really, really good summer round than a half-bad and shaky winter round that ruins the economy of the organisation. Isn’t it?

Click here to view the embedded video.

Petter Solberg's car during service in Vikingskipet. Photo: pettersolberg.com

Petter Solberg ended up sixth in Rally Norway. Many people think it’s bad, and compared to what Petter was expected to do by most people I must agree. But was those expectations realistic? No.

I predicted Petter to be in the top ten and maybe score some points, which is exactly what he did – sixth place gives him two drivers points. He couldn’t do much more, that is – and was – obvious. He has got an old car, I’m sure his engine mapping is a little bit downgraded by Citroen to not allow him to be able to beat their works drivers, etc. etc. I told it all a while ago in a post here on the blog (see this link). I also told it was the best strategy, because then he could do the showoff, blame the car, and then go on with more important stuff – like the future.

That’s exactly what happens now. After Rally Norway, Petter told that the car wasn’t fresh – rather half-tired – and publically admitted that a Ford switch were possible. However, he had a meeting with Citroen on Sunday evening. The result of the meeting was, according to Petter himself, that he will continue with the Citroen in Cyprus. Citroen has promised to basically go through the whole car and also get to grips with the engine troubles haunting Petter in Norway.

So, how smart is that? Quite smart, if you ask me. I still don’t believe that you can get top material from Citroen as a privateer if it doesn’t benefit the current needs of Citroen (like Duval in Germany 2007). But, that doesn’t matter that much in Cyprus. The Cyprus Rally is a very, very demanding event with really slow average speeds – where consistency and reliability is everything. If you keep on the road with a car in one part – you’ve came a long way. And that’s where the Xsara is best. It has always been consistent and reliable, giving the drivers a very high percentage of finishes – as long as they stay on the road.

This means, Petter could well take his time to see what Citroen gives him for Cyprus, try it out – and then make a decision. He wont lose on doing it – rather win. But then – after Cyprus – I think his best choice (if he wants to get good results) is Ford.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks to Paulf7uk.

Jari-Matti Latvala and Mikko Hirvonen - only a matter of time before they rule the WRC. Photo: BP Ford WRT / Les Kolczak.

I knew that Mikko Hirvonen and Jari-Matti Latvala both were dedicated to rallying – of course everyone in the WRC top is, otherwise they wouldn’t be there. But the Ford drivers’ quotes from the post event press-conference in Norway makes me even more sure they both are upcoming dominants in the WRC. At the moment they’re just unlucky they are into the sport at the same time as the best ever rally driver who drives for the currently most consistent manufacturer. However, maybe they’ll one day be able to beat Sebastien Loeb by driving – otherwise they’ll have to wait until he gets tired of winning. But I’m sure they will win. Look at Latvala, who’s honestly angry on himself for not being able to challenge for the win in the totally crazy fight between Loeb and Hirvonen – going so fast that both the combattants seemsto be honestly surprised they stayed on the road. And look at Hirvonen, who’s wonderful passion seems to be close to madness. In the press-conference, asked about how to beat Sebastien, he said:

- I go to the next rally and try again. My son is three and a half years old, he plays with his small cars and says: “Here’s Sebastien, it’s very difficult to beat Sebastien…”. He’s going to think it’s impossible if I don’t try.

That’s dedication.

Patrik Sandell and Emil Axelsson on the podium in Norway after a fantastic PWRC performance. Photo: Red Bull

It became a fantastic Swedish weekend in Norway. Patrik Sandell showed everyone the pace of the Skoda Fabia Super2000 when he took the lead on the first stage and kept it to the finish – the first ever victory of the Fabia S2000 and a perfect start to the Red Bull team’s PWRC assault.

PG Andersson had to retire after a clutch problem on the second day – but he is probably still considered start of the rally for most people following Norway from start to end. In his ancient Fabia WRC he took two stage wins and showed many people, including star driver Petter Solberg, that he should have a place in the world top of rallying. It’s a shame it will probably not improve his chances of having a good drive this year, but hopefully it at least improves his position negotiating with teams for next years Super2000 introduction in the WRC.

Patrik Flodin were unlucky and went into the ditch already on day one. After that he struggled on the road – but way distant from the top placings. It will be interesting to see if his good relations with the Uspenskiy team continues even after a failure. It’s easy to be friends while winning…

In my opinion the WRC needs high quality events, not a big number of events. We all know that the quality of the current events differ much. I wont name good or bad – since I don’t always agree with the measures used. Driver bash some events, FIA bash others. The drivers most often want perfect conditions, while FIA want strange things such as media stands fitted exactly – on the centimeter – right according to their rules. Sponsors and spectators want events with spectacular conditions and big drama. This doesn’t always match the will of FIA, ISC or drivers. The ranking system needs to be improved – and then maybe the two worst events in years calendar can placed on a special list for a few years, with the potential of replacing it (after a few years) if it doesn’t get better. Potential new events could still be ran as candidate events, but never with a guarantee of getting into the championship. That would give organisers continuity but still keep a good opening of getting in new events.

I don’t have the perfect answer to this, but I know that selling out events in the championship to anyone willing to pay is stupid. Really stupid.

I’m not sure why they are delaying their coverage, but of course it’s hard to produce live TV. I was responsible for live coverage on the Swedish Rally website in 2007, and there was a lot of problems. However, it is possible. It can be done the old-fashioned way with satellites or an aircraft relaying images from the stages – or it may be done in more modern ways, as I proved with Nordisk Mobiltelefon and Daniel Carlsson in last years Swedish rally (see previous post). That solution was based on mobile technology and data transfer using a mobile network with really good coverage. It worked perfectly well!

However, a big part of ISCs problems is their old-school solution taking images from in-car cameras. At least when I worked at the Swedish Rally in 2007, ISC used camcorders in the cars and retrieved DV-tapes from the recorders during service brakes. Of course that’s hard to broadcast live. I guess they’re looking at better options after seeing Eurosport’s coverage from Monte. It’s quite obvious with the technology of today that it’s perfectly possible to do live coverage – you just have to want to work hard and invest. And that’s where the problems seems to have been with ISC… Let’s hope they shape up now.

But now, on the second loop – things have changed! The group N cars running in the first loop have moved some snow out on the stages making them slippery for the top runners. That means advantage for the later runners – which was immediately shown by PG Andersson, taking the stage win on SS6.

Some people have had problems this morning, including both home runners in the Adapta World Rally Team. Anders Gröndal went off the road into a ditch on SS5. He managed to get back on the road, but the car is damaged and he is reported to have gearbox problems. Remains to see if the Adapta WRT can fix the problems in the remote service. No matter what, he is now more than 12 minutes off the lead. Also Östberg had problems on SS5 when he overtook a junction and had to reverse to get back on track. He lost around one minute on the stage and is now on 13th position – but with gearbox problems reported.

In PWRC Patrik Sandell shows the potential of the Skoda Fabia S2000 and leads the field. However, Andreas Mikkelsen has beaten Sandell in two stages in a row now, showing that the classical group N cars can still challenge. Sandell will have to look out not to be overtaken by Mikkelsen who is less than 10 seconds behind. For Flodin and Brynhildsen everything seems to have went wrong on SS5. Both have lost more than 11 minutes, but the problem is unknown. Clear is that they wont be battling for the PWRC victory.

The battle in Norway will continue at 12:51 local time with the Opaker stage.

Why?

Because in WRC you get seen – even if you’re in 5th place. Group N is downprioritized in media and in the eyes of many spectators, so there is only one way to be seen there – to win. That’s the only thing that matters. Of course all WRC competitors also wants to win, but if you’re in top eight (=points) – you’ve still made a quite good achievement and people will probably remember your name for a while.

So, Brynhildsen, Mikkelsen, Flodin and Sandell may all be nervous – and they should be.
The winner takes it all!

Here is the video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

UPDATE: As I guessed – now Hirvonen is on it too doing more rounds.

Full list here:
http://static.rallynorway.no/files/2009/RN/Shakedown_order_5.pdf
[ UPDATED LIST]

Click here to view the embedded video.

First thing, he saw plenty of snow today:

- It’s a lot of snow, but not very much ice. I guess it will show up some gravel during the rally, but it looks wonderful at least. We had no problems at all during the recce, besides having a really long day after doing the drive down to Oslo to recce the arena stage there. Now we’re back in Lillehammer again, have just had some dinner and are going for an early night before going out on the recce again tomorrow, says Flodin.

Flodin drives for the Uspenskiy World Rally Team, based in Russia. A few days ago they were testing in Lima – just over the border in Sweden from Norway. The end was happy – but Patrik was really struggling during the test:

- The start wasn’t really good… The new tyres made everything really slippery and it took quite a while before we found out a setup that worked out well. As soon as you got a little bit off track or tried to cut corners just a little it got really slippery and I felt that I totally lost the car – and it wasn’t even a lot of loose snow. The old tyres had much more sideways grip. One things that’s sure is that it wont be fun at all to the first few WRC cars this weekend, and Loeb will for sure lose time the first day.

Present at the test were also Mikkelsen, who has stepped in as Patrik’s teammate for Rally Norway. I wondered if they compared times – but Patrik is so cool he didn’t even bother:

- I guess the team can compare us in the log, but who cares? Anyone can go fast on one single test road. We’ll see when the rally starts.

Coming to Norway Flodin gets into a real “nest of wasps”. Patrik Sandell has a car that proved really fast in Monte Carlo and Eyvind Brynhildsen among with Flodin’s teammate Mikkelsen must be counted as the main concurrents – but Flodin will look out even for other names:

- Both Prokop and Arai have made good times from time to time and the competition in my class will be really tough. I want to win the class, absolutely, that’s my goal going into the rally!

To us following rally closely, it has been quite obvious that Patrik have had a hard time for a while. Patrik does agree, but he’s also got a feeling things have changed and looks bright on the future:

- It has been tough for quite a while, but it has turned again. I think it started to get better last summer and after a good autumn and now three rally victories in a row I’ve got my self-confidence back. It feels good again!

So, with a drive secured for Uspenskiy for the rest of the 2009 season and a good feeling going into the car – how do Flodin look on his future? He has already stated that the Uspenskiy team is really good, but what about the dream of WRC? Is it still there, is he happy with group N – or is he looking for Super2000?

- I’m more looking at Super2000 than the WRC. This year is really important to me, to show that I can do great results for the team all the time. Then I guess you’ll have to wait and see what happens. There seems to be many teams going into Super2000, so maybe one could get a drive next year for at least a reasonable amount of money.

So, conclusion after this interview is that we hopefully will see Patrik doing good results in the PWRC – and maybe a Super2000 drive next year. Personally I think that it went to fast for him a few years ago when he outpaced the concurrence in the Swedish Championship and then went straight on into an international career and a few WRC drives. Now he have had time to gain some experience and cool down, and hopefully he can get the flow back – but now on a higher level. He is just 24, so there is no need to hurry!

The accident happened on a very narrow part of the stage called “The Mountain” and the car and the truck collided almost front-to-front. The truck driver and passenger escaped without serious injuries.

Now a team car of Ford with two of Henning Solberg’s mechanics on-board have collided with a truck in Norway during the recce. One of the men got stuck in the car until authorities could cut him out. There are currently no reports of how seriously injured the two men are, but police as well as helicopter ambulance were directed to the scene.

Of course this disturbs Henning’s concentration going into his home rally, but at the moment let’s forget that until we know that noone has gotten serious injuries in the accident.

Read more about the crash on VG (in Norweigan): 
http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/artikkel.php?artid=540717

Asking what brands PG has been in contact with, he lined up Proton (as we already know), Fiat (not unexpected), Peugeot (not unexpected) and Opel (a little bit more unexpected).

The Opel outfit is ran by MSD – the same team that ran the Hyundai WRC team with the Accent WRC world rally car. From what I know they’ve developed a Super2000 version of the Opel Corsa, but I have no information about any rally starts or results. However, I’ve heard that Gareth MacHale from Ireland will use the car in an IRC assault this year. Without knowing any details, my guess is that the car will not be one of the top competitors among the Super2000 cars on launch, but it remains to see if I’m right. I would love to be wrong! [ Do you have any more details on the Open/MSD Super 2000 project? Please contact me on info@maxattack.net. ]

So, looking on the future of PG Andersson – it’s the same for him as for many other drivers; it depends on money. A qualified guess is that PG will spend his efforts on getting anything good, probably in a Super2000 car, for the 2010 season. If so – I think it would be a wise decision…

- It worked out quite well. I want to change some small things, but overall it works fine. On Wednesday we will get new differentials delivered, so we will try to fit them on the car before shakedown to test them there. Besides that, it’s the same car as I used in the Norweigan Championship – the only difference is that it’s now completely gone-through and checked.

In 2008, PG was works driver for the Suzuki World Rally Team. However, after just one year of competition – Suzuki decided to close their WRC activity and blamed the financial crisis. Just looking at the chassi, the Skoda Fabia WRC is quite similar to the Suzuki, but we all know that means almost nothing. So, how similar are the two cars? PG answers:

- In size, they’re quite similar and they also have the same type of suspension, so it’s not a major difference – but all cars have their own character. The Skoda has a little bit more torque than the Suzuki, but it lacks a bit of top capacity. Besides that, the Suzuki was more aggressive and therefore harder to drive than the Skoda.

Surprisingly, PG’s regular co-driver Jonas Andersson can’t accompany him in Norway. He is a building worker and got a new employer in December that doesn’t seem to like rallying – despite the building company being Norweigan, Jonas can’t get off-duty. That means that Anders Fredriksson will join PG in the rally. He is not completely new to PG and the Skoda, since he has done quite some rallies with PG before – and also was the first one in the right seat when PG tested the WRC Skoda for the first time.

Yesterday I talked to Patrik Sandell, who said that the new wider Pirelli Sottozero tyres worked good in the tracks but made it really slippery in the snow. PG seems to agree to that, but he doesn’t share Patrik’s theory that the tyres would favour Scandinavians:

- The tyres work really well in the tracks, but as soon as you get out of the track it get’s slippery. Of course it has always been slippery out there, but now it’s even worse than before. Now it has been snowing quite a lot, but I can’t see that it would favour us Scandinavians. I think Loeb and the others can keep into the track too…

Talking about Sandell, some people have speculated on the Fabia Super2000 car being able to beat the Fabia WRC, probably much because of the good initial result of the Proton S2000 in Ireland. However, this seemed to depend much on the tyres in the difficult Ireland conditions – and PG doesn’t give much about the thought about the Fabia S2000 beating the WRC, if nothing happens of course:

- I’m nooot worried, says PG with a laugh.

As I mentioned previously, PG’s start has been surrounded by economical problems. However, those seems to be solved now, but the rest of the season looks dark:

- We’re obviously here and we’re gonna drive – but there wont be any money left after that, is PG’s short answer being questioned by me about the economical situation.

So, what can we expect in Rally Norway? During todays tests, PG drove on the same roads as Petter Solberg on Finnskogen. They did some comparisons and after winning two Norweigan Championship rallies PG seems to look resonably bright on his chances, despite not having a top car:

- Petter did his last run today 4 seconds faster than me with new tyres on a 9 km road, and I set my time using tyres that I had driven on for 100-110 km’s, so it seemed quite okay. The opposition now is of course totally different from the Norweigan Championship rounds I’ve driven, so if I can finish on fifth or sixth position I have to be really satisfied. You can’t really drive away from the Fords and Citroens, so you have to have some luck too. If I can battle somewhere around Mads Östberg I’ll have to be happy…

Luckily, the guys does testing in Finnskogen, Norway today and hopefully they get a lot of km’s to build up their cooperation and experience.

Check out the Aava-in-the-ditch-picture.

During this weekend, Patrik Sandell tested the Fabia Super2000 in Kall, close to his home soil in Jämtland, Sweden. I called him afterwards to ask a few questions regarding the car, the team and the feelings in the test. I got a feeling that Patrik was satisfied and optimistic – but still a little bit cautious – regarding the upcoming Rally Norway. Not so strange, I guess – since the Fabia has never before been tested on real snow conditions. Anyway, Patrik’s first impression of that car seems to have been really good:

- Already when I first got into the car on Saturday lunch I got a really good feeling. Since then we’ve only made small adjustments and tried to find an optimal setup, and it have worked out really great without any incidents. Since the car has never been driven on full snow before, we started off from a gravel setup and worked from that. We ended up with a setup we were really satisfied with, and switched to another road to verify it really worked out well on different road types. Even Raimund [Baumschlager, team manager of Red Bull Skoda], who works as a test driver for Skoda, tested the setup and said it was really good. Noone should be able to judge it better, since Raimund was the first one driving the car a year ago and he has got more than 1000 SS km’s in the car since then.

The snow test this weekend was Patrik’s first time really testing the Skoda in high speed – but actually it wasn’t the first time he sat in the car. Few people know, but Patrik has seen the car and checked out the cockpit one time last autumn in France, while Hänninen and Kopecky (Skoda works drivers in IRC) were driving tests. However, now he has had the chance to drive the car for real, and since Patrik has driven both the Peugeot 207 S2000 and the Skoda Fabia WRC I could hardly stop wondering – how is the Fabia S2000 compared to them?

- The Skoda Fabia is really hard to compare to the Peugeot 207, they doesn’t at all remind of each other. The Skoda Fabia WRC comparison is much better, since they feel much more similar to each other. It feels like Skoda took the best parts out of the WRC and fitted them into the Super 2000 regulations. It will be interesting to see how the do against each other – but no matter what, I really believe in this car and the Red Bull team works really well.

Now, if Patrik wants the comparison – he’ll get it really soon. Another good Swedish driver will do Rally Norway in the Fabia WRC; P.G. Andersson. After seeing Niall McShea’s initial performance in the Proton S2000 car in Rally Ireland, I think it’s not totally unrealistic dreams that a S2000 car could beat WRC cars lower in the field. Question is just – is PG one of them?

As a conclusion, Rally Norway will mean many new things to Patrik, his car and his team. New car, new team, new surface (as I wrote, the Fabia S2000 has never been driven on snow previously) and not least new tyres. New for the season is the new, wider Pirelli Sottozero tyres used for snow:

- We ran on the new tyres in the test, and I think they are good – especially for us Scandinavians. The older ones were narrower and that meant quite good grip everywhere, including in the loose. Those new ones have really good grip in the track, but as soon as you get out of the track it’s really, really slippery. I think that will be an advantage to us that are used to driving on snow.

Tomorrow Patrik leaves for Norway to start the recce on Tuesday and Wendesday. The big concurrents are all Scandinavians youngsters – Flodin, Mikkelsen and Brynhildsen. However, Patrik has one other warning too:

- Martin Prokop performed really well on the last day of the Swedish Rally 2008, he may be a threat. Myself, I want to win in Norway if the team doesn’t have other plans for me. However, we must remember it’s our first time in the new car and the first time on snow for Skoda, but hopefully it will work out well. Then we should be battling in the top of our class…

Do you want to see photos or video of the test? Check out my post from yesterday.

Anyway, here is the video from TVNorge of Petter’s test (sorry for the scrolling):

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks to Styylie for the nice video.

So, Henning decided to expand his testing schedule a little. This Saturday and Sunday he is testing with the Stobart team in Gol, Norway. The bill goes to Henning, but it may be worth it. Today they’ve adjusted differentials, for example – and the testing probably means that older brother Solberg will be a lot warmer in his clothes than he would have been otherwise.

Now, he just needs to hope for the victory… I actually think he has good chances, but I don’t think he will do it. Hirvonen or Latvala will beat him, but a podium position is not at all unrealistic. However, it’s easy to want a little bit too much, so let’s hope Henning doesn’t end up in a snowbank somewhere. We’ll see in a week…

While we wait, let’s check out some pictures I took in the Swedish Rally 2006. Hopefully Henning see’s them too – so he knows how he shouldn’t do.

Quite funny, considering they’re a tyre manufacturer…

For a picture of the car, follow this link.

Here is a video, posted by Patrik himself, of today’s test:

Click here to view the embedded video.

The list isn’t very long, but I think that’s what we can expect from this years WRC – and it’s at last quite high quality so it wont be a big problem. However, you can’t avoid wondering about overseas rounds such as Argentina and Australia – what will they look like? I think we can be down in as low as around 30 competitors there, and that wont be really good.

It became a weekend exactly as expected as anyone could fear in Ireland. Loeb first and Sordo second. Hirvonen trying to challenge – but ending up in third and Jari-Matti Latvala failed to finish. One of the few surprises was that Pirellis Sottozero winter-tyres in many situations proved to be better suited to the conditions than the tarmac tyres because of the extremely heavy rain. Once again, tyre choices on tarmac proved crucial – but in the end of the first day everyone had learnt about the Sottozero advantage – and everything was back to normal in the results table.

Before the rally I hoped that Chris Atkinson would show new strength landing in a new car – the Citroen C4 WRC. Partially he did, as he showed some good speed on the second day. However, he also proved that he wants too much by making two off road excursions. One was a really serious high-speed accident on day one where the crew should be really happy to escape uninjured – and one happened on the last day. The later one was really a disappointment, since it happened while Atko was battling Henning Solberg for fourth place. Looking back in Atkinson’s records he has gone off way too many times while battling for places. By now, he really should have learnt to keep high speed while staying exactly within the limit. However, I still hope that Atko can get the finances ready for more rallies to show his speed. Subaru was a really bad car and it’s not easy to get into a new car and deliver immediately – especially not in the Irish conditions this weekend – so he should get a few chances more. Atko himself named Greece and Australia as possible rallies to drive.

Unfortunately, also Urmo Aava proved to be the same old Urmo as ever. He is really fast and for a short while in the beginning he led the rally. I hoped for him to stay on the road, but already on SS6 he ended up somewhere off the stage. He got back into the rally an ended 10th, but that doesn’t mean too much. I don’t know why it happens, but now that Urmo has a fast car to drive for almost a whole season he really needs to switch focus. He should start off slow (many others go embarassingly slow, so why not him?) and then slowly increase the speed until he reaches that limit where he can’t go faster without going off. Everyone in the business knows that he can be fast – but everyone also knows that he rarely stays on the road. I think he could do really good results even if he stayed at 98-99% of his capacity – and then with much lower risk to go off.

Luckily, Rally Ireland also offered some small but still good surprises. Reigning JWRC champion Sebastien Ogier only did his second rally in a WRC car but managed to finish sixth, scoring three championship points. Even though Ogier wasn’t very fast I consider this very promising. If he can manage to score sixth place in his second WRC rally, there should be no problem finding the speed when he has collected some more WRC experience. But by finishing such a difficult rally as Ireland, he shows a mature and serious approach. In two weeks Ogier has scored an IRC win in difficult Monte Carlo and then a sixth place in Ireland – which is a really, really impressive performance.

Second happy surprise was Henning Solberg, finishing the rally just outside the podium. Henning has consistently been a catastrophe on tarmac, but on the gravel-like bumpy tarmac in Ireland he found his pace. With the new, top-spec Ford Focus he managed to do some okay stagetimes and most important he stayed cold in the battle with Chris Atkinson. After seeing Henning do such a decent result on tarmac, you can’t keep from wondering what he will be up to in Norway in two weeks? I’ve seen him on snow a number of times – and even since I don’t consider Henning top notch WRC material I think he can really battle for the win in Norway. I would be really, really surprised if he didn’t beat Petter – at least if he manages to stay on the road with an intact car. We’ll see in two weeks – in a rally that hopefully is a little bit less predictable than Ireland…

A dream scenario to us swedes would be a close fight with both Patrik (Flodin) and Patrik (Sandell) in the top in the PWRC during the year – and one of them taking the title. Will it happen? It’s not impossible…

Photo: Tomas Hejdenbäck/patriksandell.com

Rally Ireland ends today, and with only two weeks to go before Rally Norway get’s running – many drivers are starting to warm up. One of them is Patrik Sandell, who recently presented his newly signed contract with the Red Bull team doing the full PWRC season in a Skoda Fabia Super2000. Patrik has driven the Fabia S2000 once earlier in  a very small test, but during the next week Patrik will be testing it for real in Sweden, most probably close to his home in Kall, Jämtland. It will be interesting to hear about his feelings in the car, especially considering the impressive performances of the Skodas in Monte and since I expect the class to be really close with a lot of good drivers in Norway.

A few days ago, Patrik launched his new website. He has always been good in PR and marketing, and – no offence – I think this has often saved him in the hard rally business. I know people have doubted his driving skills, but he has always been a very good representative for his sponsors brands. His new site is contains an MMS-blog, a video section and quite a lot of info – so Patrik keeps up his good marketing work. More can absolutely be done, but if all privateer drivers had a look at Patrik’s site – I think many of them would give a little bit more professional impression to their sponsors and potential sponsors. No matter what people think about Patrik’s driving skills and style, it’s quite obvious that he has proved that he has a place in the world top.

Check out Patriks website: www.patriksandell.com

Grøndal has previously driven earlier versions of the Subaru Impreza WRC in his own team. He is joined by Swedish co-driver Maria Andersson.

• He is entered and will do Rally Norway in a Citroen Xsara WRC of  modified -06 spec. 
• Petter has tested the Xsara just once (same chassi used by Conrad Rautenbach on Galway International Rally on Ireland a while ago), to be able to make his decision. The test took place in Torsby, Sweden last weekend. Before Rally Norway Petter will do more winter tests in Finnskogen, Norway.
• Petter’s team will not be run by PHSport or any other known Citroen satellite team – instead it will be a stand-alone team based in France.
• Chief engineer will be very experienced Francois Xavier-Demaison, who has previously worked with Petter in Subaru.
• Modifications on the car will include switch of dampers and brakes.
• Petter and his co-driver Phil Mills will use safety equipment from Italian manufacturer OMP as a result of a recently signed sponsorship deal.
• Petter’s plan is to compete all remaining 10 WRC rallies after Rally Norway. However, not necessarily with the Xsara WRC.
• Petter’s sponsors are not completely – but almost – in box. MSN/Microsoft is one of the sponsors that will be present on the car. (Petter has previously launched a rally game for mobile phones with MSN)

Feel free to add more in the comments if I’ve forgot anything or if you know something I don’t know.

After Ford’s test in Sweden in December Jari-Matti Latvala told that the new tyre provided more grip than he had expected under braking – but that he doubted that it would work well if the snow was really deep. The Rally Norway regions are often quite snow rich, so that would mean that the tyre could cause problems there. And that would for sure mean that you should avoid to be first out on the stages to sweep the road.

The concerns are confirmed by Pirelli’s rally manager Mario Isola:

- We’ve tested the new tyre and it’s met all our expectations. It also fulfils our brief from the FIA to slow the cars. The wider tyre does not bite through the snow as effectively, so the cars slide more. The wear might also increase, but we will see.

So, this means a slower but probably more spectacular Rally Norway. And it sends a clear message to all drivers: make sure to position yourself in the standings not to be first on the road. Which means; avoid to lead the championship after Ireland (ok, maybe we can make exceptions here) – and don’t even think about being 15th after day one or day two.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see if the new tyre makes a visible difference or if it’s just same to everyone…

Click here to view the embedded video.

Maybe, and also probably I’m afraid, it will be regarding the Adapta World Rally Team. Adapta announced already last year that they would do a large assault this season with Mads Östberg in a Subaru. Maybe it’s some kind of up-hotted release regarding that? Perhaps they’ve managed to get an even better deal following the Subaru retirement, a second Norweigan driver besides Mads Östberg and even better Prodrive support? Not big news, I guess – but eyy… Let’s hope for something better until tomorrow!

• The Xsara WRC is quite old. Launched in 2002 and left by the works team after 2005, it’s now been more than three years since it was a works car (even though it seemed to be semi-works ran in 2006).
• Citroen has been very greedy when it comes to parts on the private Xsara’s. Daniel Carlsson and Manfred Stohl was nothing else than swindled going into the Kronos team for 2007 in the Xsara. They got old parts and had a car that – no matter what driver – wasn’t even close to winning speed for most of the season. Petter will fit some new parts to it himself, and maybe he has also got better luck, but I can’t imagine Citroen releasing parts good enough to have a chance to beat their C4′s. He will have to do a lot himself…
• Petter has been first driver in front of Atkinson since 05 – now Atkinson sits in a C4 and Petter in a Xsara. Petter has a big ego (as a rally driver should have) and it will barely fit into the car now. He doesn’t expect to have winning speed – he just want to do a showoff to his home public. Probably he will go hard, but he will always have the excuse that it’s just a showoff. Not a good mental start…

So, why did Petter choose this quite faded car? Well, it starts in the last point up there. He wants to do a showoff. Safe sources tell that Petter tested in northern Värmland in Sweden this weekend – and both the Citroen and Ramsport (Ford, close to MSport) teams were there. Petter tested the Xsara for sure, maybe a C4 (but I don’t think so) and a Focus, probably a 07 or 08 spec. Of course the Ford is better than the Xsara – and the C4 too – if that was a choice. But… If he chose them – he would have been compared to Hirvonen, Latvala, Loeb, Sordo – and all the Citroen Juniors including Atko. For sure they would all have better parts than Petter (maybe he could have got the same as the Citroen juniors though). Also, Petter would have gone straight into the car without many km’s of testing, while Loeb, Sordo, Hirvonen and Latvala has already done seasons in their cars. Considering his struggling the last few years in Subaru, it would have been a catastrophe to his brand to fail in a car directly compareable to the best. Everyone would wonder “Now that Petter is in a good car – can he match the others?” an it would of course be unfair to him – as many WRC privateers have unfair chances in every rally they do.

The Xsara is quite the opposite… Even though it’s a disappointment to me and the rest of the rally community – Petter himself can only win. If he – in some strange manner – has managed to get good parts, he can become an underdog and strike from behind. Then it wont be “considering he’s in a good car” – instead it will be “despite he’s in a bad car”. And if he hasn’t, he will still just be bad because of the car. Not a big problem.

So, I’m quite sure the Xsara wasn’t the fastest option Petter could choose – just the best to himself. And I understand him. Probably he’ll do a good showoff, get somewhere in the top 10 and maybe even score some points. Then he can do what really matters to him – find a good, long term, solution.

Read more: www.pettersolberg.no

For Rally Norway, next rally of the season, all reports look really promising. With already quite a lot of snow on the stages, the forecast for Hamar is snow the next few days and temperatures around or below zero for the next ten days. Here, even more (anything) can happen to the weather, but as far as we can see the conditions and forecast should be a solid ground for a good rally.

Another option for Petter is to use the car only for testing – but that doesn’t seem very likely considering the extra engines and gearboxes he bought. Anyway, let’s assume that Petter will use the car competing in the WRC – at least in Norway.

So, what’s my opinion then? I think his results will very much depend on what gear he has managed to get from Citroen. A Xsara WRC must not be the same as a Xsara WRC – the quality may (as on any other WRC car) vary a lot depending on what parts the car is equipped with.

My own experience of that comes from Daniel Carlsson’s time with Kronos Racing in the Xsara WRC in 2007. After seeing Sebastien Loeb, we all know what a right-fitted Xsara WRC can deliver. For Carlsson in Kronos 2007, exactly the same specification as Sebastien Loeb’s 2006 World Champion car was promised from Citroen/Kronos. However, the car that was delivered was equipped with some parts that weren’t -06 and not even -05 spec. It took a long time before anything was updated, and the car was never even close to the spec of Loeb in 2006. From what I’ve heard, even Manfred Stohl was furious regarding the Xsara WRC delivered from Mr Van Dalen and Guy Frequelin.

So, the Xsara WRC may be a good car – but let’s hope Citroen doesn’t try to trick Petter Solberg. They have their own works team and also their Junior Team to take care of – so I guess Petter Solberg’s Xsara will not have the highest priority – even though he’s a star. Best for himself would probably be if he had his totally own team fitting the car with the best parts available on the market. Let’s hope that’s how it will be – otherwise Petter’s (potential) Xsara WRC experience will be a disappointment.

My comments will come later today…

For me, this means that the header of the article (“Petter can be refused”)  seems a little bit too dramatic and for short it means that Petter can change car until the checkin of the rally, as long as he stays in one of the two classes (or one class if he enters only one, which of course seems most likely since Petter for sure is aiming for to start in the WRC/A8 class). That’s at least how it has been before – in Sweden – and the same rules should apply everywhere.

At the moment, Flodin is having an unintentionally extended christmas break after getting caught speeding by the Swedish police. However, he will get his license back on the 17th of January, so no rallies of the season are in danger.

I’ll get back with a post tomorrow with my reflections on Petter’s options for 2009. Until then, goodnight!

Now PG is looking for the sponsorship needed to enter the 2nd round of the WRC 2009, Rally Norway, in a Skoda WRC. If not, he will probably enter the group N class in his own Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX. Everything according to VF (swedish newspaper).