Rally New Zealand

[Pirelli]

BP Ford Abu Dhabi World rally Team driver Mikko Hirvonen holds the lead of Rally New Zealand after a fascinating first day of competition.

Hirvonen took the lead on the second stage and capitalised on a more advantageous road position than his title rival Sebastien Loeb to build a 9.4 sec lead over the Frenchman by the midday point. But Loeb was quicker in the afternoon and narrowed the gap to less than one second before collecting a 30-second penalty when his car had trouble starting before the penultimate stage.

Whether Loeb deliberately took the penalty or not remains unclear, but it added an unexpected twist to a day which many thought would end with Hirvonen deliberately dropping back to ensure a better road position than his rival on Saturday.

“I don’t know if something was wrong or whether Citroen were playing tactics, but okay, in the end there wasn’t much I could do about it,” said Hirvonen. “But I’ve had a good day and I’ve never had such a good rhythm on these roads before. Obviously being first on the road won’t be so easy tomorrow, but I’m sure it’s going to be okay. All I can do is try my best. People want to see the same sort of close battle as last year - well it looks like it’s going to happen.”

After struggling for grip as the first car through Friday’s stages Loeb acknowledged he would be in a better position on day two, but maintained his SS6 incident was purely due to a faulty starter motor. “For one time the regulations went in the right way to help me,” said Loeb. “Okay it’s not so bad because we are second on the road and it’s not good to be first. But we are 29 seconds back and that’s a big gap. So we will see how we get on. It’s a long day tomorrow.”

Third placed Dani Sordo said he was delighted to have ended the day in the final podium spot. “It means a fantastic road position for tomorrow,” he said. “But Latvala is close behind so I will try to hold my position. It won’t be easy but I will take some risks.”

Jari-Matti Latvala holds fourth overnight - just one-tenth of a second behind Sordo - but with Saturday’s road positions determined after SS6, he will be third on the road. The Finn had tried to drop behind Sordo on the penultimate stage, but miscalculated his pace by a fraction and ended up four-tenths ahead. “It would be better to be fourth on the road, but giving away time on a stage is not an easy thing to do,” he said. “You don’t want to lose too much, but you don’t want to go too early, you have to find the midpoint. Today we didn’t get it exactly right but we’ll know for the next time.”

Almost one minute behind Latvala in fifth is Francois Duval of the Stobart VK M-Sport team. “It’s my first time with this car on these tyres and so far it’s been really good,” said Duval. “Tomorrow I’ll try a softer set-up to try and find some more grip but it’s okay. Jari is quite far ahead now, but I’ll be watching out for Aava behind me.”

Estonian Aava lies sixth, 33sec adrift of Duval in his P-H Sport run Citroen C4 WRC. Behind him in seventh is Petter Solberg of the Subaru World Rally Team, while Suzuki’s P-G Andersson is eighth in the final points winning place.

[Pirelli]

Some Action from the Rally

[Nabil]

Atkinson to restart on day two
The Subaru World Rally Team has confirmed that Chris Atkinson will restart Rally New Zealand on Saturday as a Superally entrant.

Atkinson retired from Friday's competition after a roll on stage four. The Australian was caught out on a downhill braking section and lost 40 seconds when his Impreza rolled into a ditch. Although he managed to get the car back on the road, he stopped 500 metres before the stage end when the engine cut out as a result of the accident damage.

By missing four stages Atkinson will receive a twenty minute penalty when he restarts.

“It’s disappointing for sure, but the car just got sideways and on full opposite lock I ended up cutting a corner too much and it just went over” said Atkinson. “We were pushing pretty hard this morning and maybe a little harder after the service, but it’s just disappointing that we weren’t able to get closer to the pace. We’ll take tomorrow as more testing and mileage and see what we’re able to do.”

Throughout the morning's stages both Atkinson and Solberg lost time to the leaders in the slower and twisty sections. Despite reporting no specific problems, both drivers were left pondering an overall lack of pace.

“Today has been very tough” said Solberg, who holds seventh overnight. “We’ve been pushing hard, but we’re too far off the leaders. We had some problems with damaged front right suspension, and that’s where we lost most. Grip was really tricky this morning, very slippery, and it got better this afternoon, but with our road position we should have been faster.”

“There’s no getting away from the disappointment of losing one of our cars on the first day of the rally,” said David Richards, Subaru World Rally team principal. “The remainder of the event for Chris will form an extended test programme to get more mileage under his belt, whilst at the same time we’ll use what we can from this to help Petter.”

[Pirelli]

End of day two: top three reverse after tactical shuffle
The will they / won’t they question of tactics was answered on today’s final stage with a resounding ‘yes they will’.

In a dramatic finale to Saturday’s competition, both the Citroen Total and BP Ford Abu Dhabi teams played their tactical cards in an effort to give their lead drivers the best chance of success on Sunday’s final day.

Earlier in the day Loeb said he wanted a 20-second lead to counteract the road cleaning effect on Sunday, but near the end of SS13, when it became clear he wasn’t going to reach his target, the Frenchman switched to his alternative strategy and slowed before the finish line to drop all the time he had earned and slip four seconds behind Hirvonen.

“I didn’t want to slow down - for me it’s not good for the sport - but what can we do?” said Loeb. "We have regulations like this; my job is to win, so I try to do my best to win.”

Loeb’s move was no great surprise but it wasn’t the end of the story. In an effort to give his BP Ford Abu Dhabi team-mate Hirvonen a cleaner road, Jari-Matti Latvala set a lightning quick time and leapt from third to first, with a lead margin of 9.3sec. “We thought that Ford might move Latvala ahead, so it wasn’t a surprise,” said Loeb. But now the places are very close and anything is possible tomorrow. I’ll just do my best to finish first.”

Latvala said we was happy to be leading the rally, but was aware of the problems the position would give him on Sunday as first car on the road. “I was expecting to be third after today - I wanted to catch Sordo and keep the pressure on Citroen - but in the end we made a team decision to push for the lead,” said Latvala. “I think if you’re mentally strong and don’t think about it too much you can still go fast as first car; Sebastien has proved that it’s possible to make brilliant times from the position. Of course winning would be great - it’s been six months since Sweden - but I think everything will be open until the last minute.”

Hirvonen said he had done all he could throughout the day and was happy with the day’s outcome. “There was so much loose gravel that we lost traction in all the acceleration and braking points,” he explained. “I didn’t have any plan - I just had to wait and see what everybody else did. But we came through, we’re still second and the difference between the first three cars is not so big. My road position is okay - maybe Loeb’s is better - but I think it’s going to be a good fight tomorrow.”

Citroen’s Dani Sordo ended the day fourth, 2.4 sec behind Loeb, but with the best road position of the group for tomorrow’s stages. “Today has been good, but now the most important thing is to finish the rally and get some manufacturers’ points,” he said. “My road position is good, especially for Sunday’s first stage, so I’ll see what I can do there.”

Francois Duval is fifth for the Stobart VK M-Sport team, 1min 15sec behind Sordo. “Today’s stages were faster than Friday’s but we didn’t take many risks, had no problems and now we’re in a good position,” he said. Behind him, in sixth, is Urmo Aava, who had been involved in a close battle with Petter Solberg all day. “We had a good fight, even though we lost a little time earlier with a puncture,” said the Estonian. “But that’s how it is sometimes and it’s still interesting. Tomorrow the fight will carry on and let’s hope we’re faster!”

Three seconds adrift of Aava, Subaru World Rally Team driver Solberg said his day had taken a turn for the worse after the midpoint service. “We were one second per kilometre faster his morning, but we changed a lot of things in service and after that the car wasn’t easy to drive,” he said. “I had no confidence, especially when the road was slippery. The plan for Sunday is to catch Aava. But if I have another experience like earlier - when I lost 17 seconds to him in one stage - forget it. But we’ll try to improve.”

Per-Gunnar Andersson ended the day eighth and in the final points scoring place in his Suzuki SX4 WRC. “We’ve had no dramas today, we’re just fine-tuning the set-up a little bit here and there,” said Andersson. “The most important thing is to get the car to the finish. It’s hard not to push too hard, but I don’t want to make any mistakes.”

[Haissam]

i think rallye is the best motorsport ever!

love watching the live action in lebanon ;)

[Nabil]

I agree its a great sport!

I love the tactics those teams are using , who do u guys think will win this year?

[Pirelli]

I agree its a great sport!

I love the tactics those teams are using , who do u guys think will win this year?

Tough decision.......
Duval Is real Fast...
Loeb is Fast with experience...

[Nabil]

Tough decision.......
Duval Is real Fast...
Loeb is Fast with experience...

I like Duval's style :D

[Nabil]

Prokop takes debut P-WRC win
Compared with the furious battle which raged in the P-WRC on Friday and Saturday, Sunday was an almost relaxed affair for Martin Prokop who won the production category in Hamilton today.

The Czech Republic driver moved into the lead of the New Zealand P-WRC fight on Saturday when a gearbox problem forced the retirement of his closest rival, Mirco Baldacci.

Prokop began Sunday with a comfortable 1min 20sec lead over former Junior World Rally Champion Patrick Sandell in second and although Sandell narrowed the gap to 36sec by the end of the rally, Prokop said getting his car to the finish - and getting his first P-WRC win - had been his priority on the final day.

“I was taking it steady today, but that’s not as easy as you might think,” said Prokop. “When you have a lead like I did it’s quite hard to drive carefully and not make a mistake. When you’re not driving aggressively the car feels different.”

Prokop said he was pleased that his strategic approach to the rally had paid off. “Before the rally we decided we weren’t going to push too hard from the beginning - that we’d wait and see what happened to the others - and it turned out to be a good strategy,” he said “The others made many mistakes on Friday’s first stage - and we did too - but we were lucky it was nothing too bad. From then on we tried to go faster and faster. We got very close to Baldacci, but after his mistake for us it’s been fairly straightforward.”

Third place in New Zealand went to the Estonian Martin Rauam, also in a Mitsubishi Lancer EVO.

A maximum ten points moves Prokop to fifth in the 2008 P-WRC series, but after a disappointing start to the season he said he wasn’t thinking too much about the championship. “I think my chances in the Production and Junior championships are over, but it’s nice to show we have the speed and that we can win. We’ll try to do the same on the rest of the events this year.”

With two rounds of the 2008 P-WRC season remaining, Andreas Aigner leads the series with 30 points, four ahead of Juho Hanninen, who collected four points this weekend. Jari Ketomaa is third with 23 points, while eight points this weekend puts Sandell fourth on a total of 22.

[Nabil]

Ford team reflects on New Zealand shocker
BP Ford Abu Dhabi team drivers Mikko Hirvonen and Jari-Matti Latvala have revealed more details about the incidents which cost them a possible one, two result on Rally New Zealand today.
Hirvonen drove his Ford Focus RS World Rally Car to the Hamilton finish ceremony more in disappointment than celebration after a dramatic penultimate stage which cost him the lead, and brought about his team-mate’s retirement from second.
The 29.72km Whaanga Coast is one of the great challenges in the WRC and lived up to its reputation as the rally's keynote stage as firstly Latvala swiped a bank and retired with a damaged radiator and then Hirvonen punctured a tyre and later spun his Focus RS WRC, losing a minute and sliding to third.

pic from Rally Monte Carlo 2008


"This is one of the biggest disappointments of my career but that's the way sport goes," said Hirvonen. "I was confident I could drive at normal pace through that stage and win but it wasn't to be because we handed Loeb victory. It's not looking so good for either championship now but it's not impossible. An eight-point gap in the drivers' standings will be difficult to make up and it's annoying to end like this after a great weekend. But I finished on the podium and what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. The positive from this event is that I know I can win gravel rallies.
"When I saw Jari-Matti stopped in the stage I knew I just had to finish. However about 9km from the end I realised I had a slow puncture on the rear right tyre. I've no idea how, or where, it happened. Then a kilometre before the finish I spun and the impact on the bank dragged off the front bumper. It just wasn't meant to be."
Latvala's accident happened 3.5km after the start. "I approached a long left bend where the later cars in the first pass had created a narrow line,” he explained. “I lost grip at the rear and the car went sideways. I floored the throttle to try to straighten up, but it turned and I went into the inside of the corner. I hit a bank, which had a rock buried in the sand, and the impact broke the radiator and the cooler. I knew straight away that it was over because the oil temperature and water warning lights came on. I'm disappointed because I lost points for myself and the team. I was going so well and was pleased with my driving here so I thought I could finish second. It's a bad feeling but after my problems in Germany, I've learned that I have to pick myself up and carry on."
BP Ford Abu Dhabi team director Malcolm Wilson summed up the team's feelings. "This is one of the most disappointing days that we've ever had. After being in commanding first and second places going into the last countryside stage, we certainly didn't expect to find ourselves with just third. I really feel for Mikko because he drove a faultless rally and showed he can take the fight to Loeb. Both he and Jari-Matti showed tremendous pace this weekend and we'll come back fighting," he said.
Ford of Europe motorsport director Mark Deans said: "We're terribly disappointed with what happened but it's days like today that make the WRC such a fascinating sport. We were on the receiving end and this result is a blow to our hopes of retaining the manufacturers' championship, but there are still four rallies remaining so we'll fight back. We saw today how unpredictable this sport can be so it's too early to start making predictions of how the year might end."

[Nabil]