Henning Solberg and Marcus Grönholm are Stobart’s nominated points scorers for Rally Sweden… No wonder, since both are snow experts and both probably even deserve to be called Sweden expert. Marcus has won the rally five times and Henning has had numerous top scorings during the years. Without any technical problems on their Ford Focus WRCs I think both will be able to score top six placings and at least one of them probably better – maybe including podiums…
Posts Tagged ‘stobart’
Stobart likely to get a flying start of the season
Thursday, January 21st, 2010Tags: ford, ford focus wrc, henning solberg, m-sport, marcus grönholm, rally sweden, stobart
Posted in Silly season, WRC | No Comments »
PG Andersson, Gigi Galli and Henning Solberg in the 2010 World Rally Championship?
Friday, January 8th, 2010Reading Autosport’s article of yesterday regarding the manufacturer teams in the 2010 WRC, you can read a number of names that Autosport says “are expected” for the championship. No name is a complete surprise – but it would be interesting to know how good coverage David Evans has for them. He use to know good, but in this case it sounds a lot like speculation on some of the names.
First off, the safe names are Federico Villagra in Munchis WRT, Ken Block in Monster WRT, Petter Solberg in Solberg PSWRT – and the almost safe (?) Matthew Wilson in Stobart WRT. So far no problem. But then comes Henning Solberg as expected in Stobart – and that’s a little bit more uncertain. I know that Henning targets a seat in the WRC again, but I also know that this very much depends on a renewed contract with Expert for 2010. The second questionmark is Gigi Galli and PG Andersson – where one of them or even both are said to be joining the PSWRT. I know nothing about Galli, but when it comes to PG I know he was in discussions regarding the PSWRT early this autumn – but then he has announced that he probably can’t collect the money needed. I’ll get back with a small post on PG’s future later today.
So, it would be really intersting to know what facts are behind the article. If Evans get three right out of three on the uncertain things, it would be like heaven to any rally addict. I guess the future will show…
Tags: 2010, federico villagra, gigi galli, henning solberg, ken block, monster, munchis, petter solberg, pg andersson, rallycross, stobart, WRC
Posted in Silly season, WRC | 1 Comment »
Urmo Aava’s season in jeopardy because of budget trouble
Monday, February 16th, 2009Just a bit more than a month ago, Urmo Aava presented his plans for 2009 with a drive in Stobart Ford. Aava has struggled during the first two rallies of the season. In Ireland he went off after an initial impressive performance, and in Norway he finished quite low down the standings after struggling the whole weekend.
Now, it also seems that Aava’s budget is far from complete – and Stobart is just paying a small amount of Aava’s budget this year. From what I know, the rest is mostly paid by some local Estonian companies and the Estonian tourism authority. Obviously, Aava is having problems to get enough money out there, which may cause him to miss some or all of the remaining rallies in the season.
Aava’s schedule until now has been Rally Ireland, Rally Norway, Rally of Portugal, Rally Italia-Sardinia, Rally Poland, Tour de Corse (France), Spain and Wales Rally GB.
Tags: 2009, authority, estonia, ford, jeopardy, season, stobart, tourism, urmo aava
Posted in Silly season, WRC | 2 Comments »
Video: Henning furious over Stobart mistake
Friday, February 13th, 2009Henning Solberg has been a good client for MSport the last few years. This year, he is running in cooperation with Stobart where the Stobart team pays around half the bill, which means around 1.1 million euros. This year he’s the first driver of the Stobart team – always getting the best stuff available and highest priority. I just wonder, how high is highest priority and how good is the best stuff? Looking at this video, Henning indicates that it’s not always world class…
Tags: angry, furious, henning solberg, msport, stobart
Posted in Video, WRC | No Comments »
Update: Ford crew member seriously injured but in stable condition
Tuesday, February 10th, 2009Following the accident that happened to the Ford car following Henning Solberg on the recce, Norweigan newspaper Glomdalen reports that the condition of the man that got seriously injured in the accident is serious but stable. He is 32 years old, French citizen and has been transported by helicopter to Ullevåls University hospital in Oslo with head injuries and fractures. The other crew member of the car is British citizen and escaped the accident almost unhurt. Both men are members of the Stobart/Ford team.
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.
Tags: accident, crew, ford, henning solberg, mechanic, oslo, rally norway, stobart, the mountain, ullevål
Posted in WRC | 2 Comments »
Video: Henning Solberg test in Gol, Norway
Sunday, February 8th, 2009As I wrote yesterday, Henning Solberg has tested his Stobart Ford Focus WRC for the upcoming Rally Norway. Here is a video from the test:
Thanks to Styylie for the nice video.
Tags: ford focus wrc, henning solberg, rally norway, stobart, test, testing, Video
Posted in Rally testing, Video, WRC | No Comments »
Petter reveals his plan?
Friday, January 23rd, 2009Speculations regarding Petter Solberg’s future has taken a new turn. Rumours are talking about a planned press conference on Tuesday the 27th of January in the Bjerke race track, Norway. The press conference will be about the presentation of a brand new, Norweigan WRC team fully compareable to the best of factory teams.
Maybe Petter and Henning has managed to get a deal together with Ford/Stobart creating their own team, run by Ramsport? Ramsport is close to MSport and have previously worked with Andreas Mikkelsen, so they’ve already got a Norweigan connection. It would be nice to see it happen!
Expect more turns before it’s over…
Tags: bjerke race track, henning solberg, msport, norway, petter solberg, ramsport, stobart, WRC
Posted in Silly season, WRC | No Comments »
Galli may still end up in Ford for 2009
Monday, January 19th, 2009Gigi Galli had to leave his role in the Stobart team following the accident in Germany in 2008, but he got back already in December 2008 by finishing second in the Bettega Memorial rally sprint. For 2009, Galli hasn’t confirmed a programme, but he has expressed that he will get back into rallying. Now, Malcolm Wilson, managing director of M-Sport, has also confirmed that they are still talking to Galli’s management and talks about the Italian’s plans for 2009 as “unconfirmed”.
The Munchis team is lacking one driver, so there are certainly at least one fresh Ford to get. Maybe Galli is back soon?
Tags: accident, bettega memorial, ford, germany, gigi galli, m-sport, malcolm wilson, msport, munchis, stobart
Posted in Silly season, WRC | No Comments »
Henning’s lucky day
Sunday, January 11th, 2009A little bit more than a week ago Henning Solberg presented his deal: he pay’s 11M NOK (ca €1,15M) to drive with Ford/Stobart’s M2 team in all 12 rallies of the WRC season. A golden deal, considering that Henning according to himself will have a lot of testing and some extra priority included in the deal.
However, it’s quite a cheap price for the whole championship. What happened? In fact, Henning’s deal is more golden than you can imagine. Just the day before he announced his plans for 2009, he still thought he would do the season in a Peugeot 307WRC. Then – in the last hours – he got a call from Ford, offering him a drive 50% financed by Stobart (of course this means there will be some Stobart branding on the car), with testing, etc etc.
So, for Henning – that already had a car and just waited for his sponsors to commit – the decision must have been very easy. Switch back to the car he has already used for two years (before he had even left it), but in an even better deal, and save some money and problems. Crystal clear.
Tags: ford, ford focus wrc, henning solberg, peugeot 307wrc, stobart
Posted in Silly season, WRC | No Comments »
Galli and Duval may both enter the Stobart team
Saturday, January 10th, 2009Two of the more experienced WRC drivers out there that have not yet confirmed their plans for 2009 are Italian Gigi Galli and Belgian Francois Duval. Both of them competed parts of the 2008 WRC in Ford Focus WRC with the Stobart team. Now the Ford boss Malcolm Wilson admit that they may still be back in the team for 2009 – much depending on how the impact of the financial crisis develops.
Confirmed and potential drivers in Ford are now:
- Mikko Hirvonen
- Jari-Matti Latvala
- Khalid Al-Quassimi
- Matthew Wilson
- Urmo Aava
- Henning Solberg
- Federico Villagra
- (Potentially another 2nd driver in the Munchis team – may still be one of above though)
- Peter van Merksteijn
- Peter van Merksteijn Jr
- Gigi Galli
- Francois Duval
- Petter Solberg (?)
From what I know all these entries except(?) for father and son Merksteijn is to be entered and served by MSport. Seems like a huge job for MSport to drive up to 9-10 drivers per event, but they have previously proved with a lot of entries that they seem to have the capacity.
Let’s now hope that both Galli and Duval get their pieces together!
Tags: financial crisis, ford focus wrc, francois duval, gigi galli, malcolm wilson, stobart
Posted in Silly season, WRC | No Comments »



















