Rally

The former Hyundai driver will compete in a Ford Fiesta R5 at next month's Rally GB before stepping up to a Fiesta WRC for the season-closing Rally Australia. Paddon’s deal was confirmed by M-Sport Ford World Rally Team on Friday morning and comes after he was forced out of Rally Finland by a pre-event testing accident. Since that July accident, the Kiwi has been working with M-Sport and ...Keep reading View the full article

Evans and Suninen have been M-Sport's main line-up this year after Sebastien Ogier's exit for Citroen, though Evans will end up missing three WRC rounds due to a back injury sustained on the non-championship Rally Estonia. Wilson has not given up on enticing championship leader Tanak back from Toyota, which is widely expected to re-sign him, but said whatever happened with that pursuit he ...Keep reading View the full article

Roma won the prestigious marathon in the bike category in 2004, before switching to the car class the year after and going on to claim a first Dakar win on four wheels in 2014. The victory came as part of the X-Raid Mini set-up, in which Roma contested seven of the past eight Dakars - including last year's, in which he finished runner-up to Toyota's Nasser Al-Attiyah. However, in the Saudi ...Keep reading View the full article

After driving the Hilux for four days in Namibia in mid-August, two-time Formula 1 champion Alonso continued his acclimatisation to cross-country rallying, completing over 700km on Monday and Tuesday with the help of Toyota's logistic partner Overdrive. The Spaniard was able to test himself on faster roads, some of which were used during last weekend's sixth round of the FIA World Cup for Cross ...Keep reading View the full article

The Irishman made his debut with the Korean manufacturer at Rally Finland in July. Delivering an impressive performance, Breen ran in the top five for much of the Jyvaskyla event before dropping to seventh at the finish to promote his championship challenging teammate Thierry Neuville. Breen joins Neuville and Andreas Mikkelsen in Llandudno. Hyundai has also confirmed its decision to drop ...Keep reading View the full article

Hansen topped qualifying at Loheac with a dominant performance in Q4, fighting back from a difficult opening day, but was beaten away from the line in the first semi-final by title-rival Andreas Bakkerud, who won the encounter to secure pole position for the final. By qualifying third in the Intermediate Classification, Bakkerud had moved into the championship lead, two points ahead of Kevin ...Keep reading View the full article

The Lithuanian finished second on the road to Gronholm RX driver Toomas Heikkinen in the opening session of the weekend to set the fifth best time, then climbed to second at the first corner of the first race in Q2, before taking the lead and race victory after the joker laps played out. Double DTM champion Timo Scheider had made a near-perfect launch to take the lead of the same encounter in ...Keep reading View the full article

Evans sustained the injury in a bad landing from a jump when contesting the non-championship Rally Estonia in July. He has already missed the Finnish and German WRC rounds but had hoped to contest the next event in Turkey next month. But he will now have to skip that as well before returning for Rally GB on October 3-6. M-Sport team principal Rich Millener said the certainty of having a ...Keep reading View the full article

Price, who has made starts in the series in Adelaide and on the Gold Coast in the past, has signed on for SST's return to Aussie soil at this year's Surfers Paradise race. His truck will be backed by Boost Mobile and Mitsubishi Motors. “I’m super stoked that the category is back on Australian soil," said Price. "Every time I get behind the wheel of one it’s such a good time and ...Keep reading View the full article

Dani Sordo was comfortably in the fight for a podium on last weekend's Rally Germany before a gearbox issue halted his progress on the Friday, forcing him to fight back through the order over the next two days. On the stage before the gearbox issue, Sordo had just overtaken Kris Meeke, who went on to finish second after Hyundai's Thierry Neuville and Citroen's Sebastien Ogier both got ...Keep reading View the full article

Tanak had looked set to re-sign with Toyota following the end of his current contract with the team in 2019, but Wilson met with the WRC championship leader and another M-Sport ex-driver – Tanak’s advisor Markko Martin – over the Rally Germany weekend. Tanak confirmed before the start of the event that no deal had been signed with Toyota, his representatives were in talks with other teams ...Keep reading View the full article

Tanak led a clean sweep of the podium for the Japanese marque, with Kris Meeke coming home 20.8s in arrears, with Jari-Matti Latvala third. Neuville salvaged fifth behind Hyundai teammate Dani Sordo on the Powerstage – which he won – after falling out of victory contention after changing a wheel at the end of Saturday’s running. He now moves ahead of six-time WRC ...Keep reading View the full article

Hyundai driver Neuville and Tanak had been embroiled in an intense battle for the lead on Friday that continued into Saturday morning, but the fight was defused on the first run through the 41km Panzerplatte stage. Neuville collected a rear-left puncture early on the stage, but incredibly minimised the time loss to just 1m26.8s after stopping to change the tyre. Nonetheless, he plummeted from ...Keep reading View the full article

Drivers suffered multiple punctures on the pre-event recce, but Neuville was the only leading driver to fall foul in the event proper, suffering a deflated cover in the first half of the stage on his i20 Coupe WRC. The Belgian driver had trailed Tanak by 5.6s heading into the stage, and entered the event 25-points behind Tanak in the WRC points’ standings. Toyota’s Tanak takes a lead ...Keep reading View the full article

On SS5 of the World Rally Championship's German round, during the second running of the 19.44kmh Stein und Wein stage, the spectator fell off a short wall “head first” onto the stage on a straight section, just as Ostberg rounded a quick right-hander in his Citroen C3 R5. Ostberg veered left in a desperate attempt to avoid the spectator who he said he missed by ‘half a metre or a ...Keep reading View the full article

Neuville had chopped 1.3 seconds out of Tanak on the first run of Freisen to trim the Toyota driver’s overall advantage to 1.5s. But he overcooked his entry and stalled into a hairpin on the proceeding Romerstrasse test. He dropped 6.7s to Tanak who won the stage when a stubborn fuse delayed him further when trying to restart the Hyundai. Neuville nicked 0.2s back on the repeat of Freisen ...Keep reading View the full article

Their afternoon battle replicated their morning form - Neuville quickest on the opening stage then World Rally Championship leader Tanak fighting back on the next two. Hyundai driver Neuville managed to halve Tanak's previous 3.2-second lead on the Stein und Wein stage, but Tanak inched the gap back up to 2.8s by the day's conclusion. Blighted by understeer in his Citroen all morning ...Keep reading View the full article

Hyundai driver Neuville had snatched first place from Thursday evening pacesetter Tanak's Toyota by going quickest on the opening Stein und Wein stage, taking a 0.7-second lead. But Tanak - who is chasing a third straight Germany victory and already leads the WRC standings - retaliated with stage wins on Mittelmosel and Wadern-Weiskirchen, putting him 3.2s clear as they headed for midday ...Keep reading View the full article

The first stage offered a rare opportunity for crews to tackle a representative road to open the rally – having also used the test on shakedown – with many events in the WRC opting for city centre or super-special style stages to start rallies. Tanak – driving a Toyota with a revised rear wing – set a time of 2m39.4s and jumped to the top of the leaderboard as the last competitive World ...Keep reading View the full article

During the Rally Finland weekend, the FIA said a clarification of rear wing measurements was necessary, while stressing that no car in the championship was running illegally. Toyota’s rear wing aerodynamic specification hasn’t changed since the 2017 season, when the current regulations came in. Toyota Gazoo Racing’s WRC team boss Tommi Makinen told Motorsport.com: “There are some small ...Keep reading View the full article