Rally

The Concepcion-based RallyMobil ran without fault and was lauded by senior WRC officials attending what looks to have been a dress rehearsal for inclusion on the 2019 calendar.WRC Promoter’s Oliver Ciesla told Motorsport.com: “From a promotional point of view this rally really delivered."For what was essentially a national-level rally, the infrastructure is amazing. There’s solid ... Keep reading View the full article

The governing body has objected to the use of the Great Orme/Llandudno stage as the bonus point-paying Power Stage on the final day of the October event.Current WRC sporting regulations state the Power Stage should “be representative of the rally.” The FIA feels the all-asphalt Orme and Llandudno town stage fails to meet this criteria.Using Llandudno would bring world championship ... Keep reading View the full article

The Spaniard was present at last weekend’s World RX opener in Barcelona where he was spotted talking to Prodrive personnel, prompting speculation he was on the verge of moving to Guerlain Chicherit’s GCK team.Sordo, who drove the Banbury team’s Mini John Coooper Works WRC for two years, has told Motorsport.com his priority is to remain in the WRC with Hyundai.He said: “I went to the ... Keep reading View the full article

Ostberg, a Citroen works driver in 2014 and 2015, drafted back into the team for Rally Sweden in February and finished sixth.Since then, he has been working to secure further outings in a C3 and he announced on Wednesday that he would be back in the team for Portugal and Italy."It feels really good to be back in the car and back with the team again after a long break since Rally ... Keep reading View the full article

Despite being just a season in to the five-year homologation cycle, the sport’s powerbrokers are keen to explore future technical regulations for the WRC’s premier class of car.Those discussions will include the potential for alternative energies being used in rallying.FIA president Jean Todt wants to see the WRC embracing alternative technology, but as a former competitor and team ... Keep reading View the full article

The organisers of Britain’s World Rally Championship qualifier will now have to rethink the final day of the October event after the governing body declined a planned powerstage using the all-asphalt Great Orme test, which had been extended into the centre of Llandudno.The original route had the Deeside-based event concluding with Britain’s first ever world championship-level ... Keep reading View the full article

The 50-year-old American will tackle the Spanish event on October 25-28 at the wheel of a M-Sport Ford Fiesta entered under the 'Hoonigan Racing Division' banner alongside regular co-driver Alex Gelsomino.It will mark his first WRC appearance since he last contested Rally Catalunya in 2014 [pictured below], as well as his first outing in a current-generation World Rally car.Ford ... Keep reading View the full article

While MRF refused to go into details in the press release confirming the move, it is believed that Gill will compete in the seven remaining gravel rallies on the calendar, the first of which is due to take place in Argentina later this month.Rallies in Portugal, Italy, Finland, Turkey, the UK as well as Australia also take place on gravel terrain.It is unclear which car Gill will be ... Keep reading View the full article

The Audi driver's disqualification from the final at the Spanish Grand Prix venue hands victory to reigning champion Johan Kristoffersson.Ekstrom and Solberg ran side-by-side into the first corner of the final, with Solberg forced into the tyre wall on the inside and spun out of contention.“[Car] #5 [Ekstrom] did not respect car #11 [Solberg], located at his left after the start ... Keep reading View the full article

2016 champion Ekstrom had been fifth on lap one of semi-final two, the Swede jinking his Audi S1 wide on the entry to Turn 1 in a bid for an outside move, but lost out to the chasing gaggle of cars.He fought back to be second in the latter stages of the race and when Timmy Hansen’s race-leading Peugeot slowed, Ekstrom took the lead and the victory.Lining up alongside top qualifier ... Keep reading View the full article

Solberg continued his Saturday form into the final day by setting the fastest time in Q3, track conditions improving throughout under baking sunshine, allowing Solberg’s winning time from the final encounter to be 10.621s up on the previous best time, set by Niclas Gronholm in the third race.The triple FIA World Champion then led the final race of Q4 and despite just missing out on ... Keep reading View the full article

Second fastest in Q1 behind former DTM racer Mattias Ekstrom, Solberg took the lead of the final race of the day in Q2 when leader Sebastien Loeb spun his Peugeot 208 mid-way through the opening lap and Ekstrom’s teammate, Andreas Bakkerud, served his joker lap at the first opportunity.From there on, Solberg led the race comfortably to set the fastest time and move into the top spot ... Keep reading View the full article

Guerlain Chicherit, whose team revealed the revolutionary Megane RS in Paris earlier this month, will start his first World RX round as a team owner and driver in Barcelona this weekend.The Frenchman has self-financed the development, production and running of the car and team, but hopes early success will persuade the French manufacturer to divert some o ... Keep reading View the full article

Loeb won a quarter of the stages on last week’s Tour de Corse, despite last competing on the island 10 years earlier and having been away from a full-time WRC programme since 2012.The Frenchman was a frontrunner early on in Corsica, as he had been on last month's Rally Mexico, but lost his chance of fighting for victory on the second stage when he got his C3 stuck in a ditch.That ... Keep reading View the full article

The new Fiesta, which has been built from the ground up at OMSE’s Nynashamn base in Sweden, marks a return to World RX for the Ford Performance name.Having become involved with Andreas Eriksson’s OMSE squad in 2009, the automotive giant partnered the Swedish squad to win the first World RX Teams’ Championship in 2014, before supporting Ken Block’s Hoonigan Racing Division squad for ... Keep reading View the full article

Present at last week's Tour de Corse, Todt told Motorsport.com he still saw endurance very much as part of the appeal and challenge of the WRC.Event organisers collectively feel under pressure to reduce the competitive distance on stages, with last month's Rally Mexico an example, with the series' most arduous event reducing the length of its longest test from 50 miles in 2016 to 35 ... Keep reading View the full article

The Frenchman gave up nearly one third of his advantage over Ott Tanak in the 55.17km Vero-Sarrola-Carcopino stage, but he still started the Power Stage with a gap of 31 seconds.Tanak, who started the day 0.1s ahead of Thierry Neuville, secured the runner-up position by comfortably topping SS11.Neuville completed the podium ahead of Dani Sordo, who moved up a place as a result of ... Keep reading View the full article

The Frenchman did not top any of the three stages but was consistently in the top five and his advantage has gone up to 44.5s.Thierry Neuville lost second place for the first time since Friday morning to Meeke in the second stage of the afternoon, only for the Citroen driver to stop in the subsequent SS10.Meeke was the third driver to hit trouble during the loop, withLatvala hitting ... Keep reading View the full article

Loeb narrowly topped both SS5 and SS6 with gaps of 1.0s and 1.4s respectively.The Citroen driver, who skipped the Friday afternoon loop after going into a ditch in SS2 and dropped as low 57th in the overall order as a result, said he is now only driving for fun."After yesterday now is just to have fun in the car," he said after taking his second stage win of the day. "It is ... Keep reading View the full article

Just like in the morning, Ogier was comfortably fastest in the 49.03km La Porta - Valle di Rostino stage, beating the rest of the field by over 10 seconds.Although it was Esapekka Lappi topping the subsequent SS4, Ogier lost only 1.8s and the Frenchman ended the day with a lead of 33.6s.Thierry Neuville was Ogier's closest challenger in the SS3 marathon and is second overall as a ... Keep reading View the full article