VIDEO: Hayden Paddon first Subaru test

Posted on March 20, 2011 by Daniel Darrall

New Zealand star Hayden Paddon and co-driver John Kennard have been testing their new Symtech prepared Subaru in Spain ahead of Rally Portugal which will be the first round of their PWRC campaign.

Happy with the test, and excited to take the car onto the World stage, Hayden said, “Our test in spain was very succesful. I am very happy where the car is and the progress that we made. Already I am feeling comfortable behind the wheel. The proof of where we are will be next week when we can compare ourselves to others, but my initial feeling is that the car is much quicker. Bring on Rally Portugal.”

You can all of Haydens text updates/comments and photos as well as updates throughout the rally on www.facebook.com/haydenpaddonwrc 

For more information, please visit www.haydenpaddon.com.

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Round 3 – Rally de Portugal 2011 preview

Posted on March 20, 2011 by Daniel Darrall

WRC Round 3 of 13, Rally de Portugal. 24-27 March 2011

Photo: D.Darrall

 

This is the rally everybody has been waiting for. For the first time this season we get a real comparison between the Fords and the Citroens. This coming weekend will be war. Ford took first blood in the frozen forests of Sweden to lock out the podium, then in the high altitude mountains of Mexico, it was almost civil war between the two Citroen’s, both fighting each other for dominance, both for in the team and the championship. Which ended with Ogier over the limit and off the road, and Seb Loeb taking the win. But the two Fords consistency got them on the other two steps of the podium.

With both Sweden and Mexico being specialist events, the first time we get to really compare the two cars on gravel will be in portugal this weekend. It won’t just be a battle between Sebastien Loeb and Mikko Hirvonen, but also of Xavier Mestelan-Pinon and Christian Loriaux. Who’s built and designed the better car? The Citroen DS3 or the Ford Fiesta RS.

Who will win? Apart from Loeb, the other favorites for victory will be Ogier and Solberg. Ogier took his first WRC victory here just 10 months ago, beating his french team mate Loeb in a straight fight over the 3 days. Solberg will be chasing that illusive first win for 5 years and with both of them running six and five on the road respectively. The Portuguese gravel does clean if it stays dry, however drivers ahead can unearth big suspension-smashing rocks. Winning from the front is certainly possible, even in the driest of conditions – as Ogier demonstrated last season.

This years Rally Portugal has been moved from May to March, and could make a big difference to the roads. Last years Summer had just stared in the Algarve, but next week we’re still firmly in spring. And that could mean changeable weather. And the condition of the roads will depend on the type of winter they’ve had. Something the crews won’t know until the recce. If it does turn wet, the running order could be turned up side down, with first on the road often becoming the most favoured position. But, if it’s dry, the gravel will be loose and championship leader Mikko Hirvonen will be forced to sweep the road for the second event in succession.

Photo: D. Darrall

Hirvonen’s team mate, Latvala has been here three times and twice, his car has departed on a tow truck. In 2009, bits of the car probably left on different tow trucks, so wide was the dispersal of Ford Focus parts after he rolled down a mountain, and last year, putting a tree 2 feet into the backend of his old Focus.

Stobart drivers Mads Ostberg, Henning Solberg and Matthew Wilson will have a good road position and will be going for a top ten finish. Ostberg Possibly aiming higher after his 2nd place in Sweden. Other Fiesta drivers keen to get to the finish will be Ken Block, who had a torrid time in Mexico retiring and SuperRallying on every day of the event. Khalid Al Qassimi and Dennis Kuipers, will both be looking to build their knowledge of the new Ford – with the Dutchman also hoping to overcome his Mexican roll.

Making a return after missing Mexco, Kimi Raikkonen will be hoping to improve on his 10th place from last year. Also Peter van Merksteijn Jr makes his Citroen debut, raising the number of DS3s to five in Faro.

Photo: D.Darrall

For the Portugues fans, Bernardo Sousa will get his chance on his home round of the world championship, driving a Fiesta RS WRC, and countryman Bruno Magalhaes will also be out to impress in his Peugeot 207 S2000, particularly on the streets of his home city in Lisbon.

But the biggest cheers will be saved for two-time PWRC champ Armindo Araujo who, along with Brazilian Daniel Oliveira, will give the new MINI John Cooper Works S2000 its much-awaited world debut on this event. The full factory World Rally Cars come in Sardinia, but this S2000 version will give a definite indication as to the direction car builder Prodrive has taken with the MINI.

Portugal will also be a round of the PWRC. Two times New Zealand rally champion, Hayden Paddon will be staring his season. Fresh from the pirelli star driver scheme last year, he will be looking for a win in his new Subaru. Martin Semerad will also be looking to build on his perfect start in Sweden with another victory in his Mitsubishi. Leading Subaru drivers Patrick Flodin and Anders Grondal will be ready to stand in the former Pirelli Star Driver’s way.

Talking of Pirelli Star Drivers, six have been selected for this season and this week will mark their first outing as part of the all-new FIA WRC Academy young driver training series. Twenty rising hopefuls will line up for the first event in identical Ford Fiesta R2s prepared and maintained by M-Sport.

Most of the event will go unchanged, though there are small changes such as Shakedown on the Wednesday, and the running of a 3.67Km SuperSpecial in Lisboa. Over the 3days there will be a total of 17 Stages, 385.37km, with Santana da Serra being the final Live TV broadcasted ‘Power Stage’, where the Championship contenders further down the table will be trying to make up for their points by gunning for the 3 bonus points.

(c) By Daniel Darrall

Photo: D.Darrall

Keep up-to-date with all the action, news, stories and Photos here on insiderally.com.

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Rally de Portugal Road trip

Posted on March 19, 2011 by Daniel Darrall

The WRC is always full of Adventure stories, and the build up to Rally Portugal is no different. Freelance Cameraman and owner of Northern-Loop Productions, David Dwyer took a 1600 mile road trip to Portugal to film Round 3 of the World Rally Championships, and tells us about his adventure on the ‘Road to the WRC’.

 

Photo: NLP

 

So after watching the sun go down on the Algarve I thought I’d put together a couple of words what I’ve actually done over the last 48 hours. So Wednesday afternoon I set off from Cardiff to drive the 1600 miles to Faro for the Rally de Portugal next weekend.

Leaving Wales, driving over the River Seven bridge I was thinking to myself what the **** am I doing, driving all this way on my own.. All was going great until I hit Heathrow and saw signs from M4 CLOSED! Great the only think I had to be on time for was the channel tunnel, so I sat there for about 3 hours moving about 10 meters.

My tunnel crossing was for 19:30 and I eventually made it there for about 21:00. The great thing about the tunnel is there is no messing around, yep I was late but popped my card into the machine and said “Yep your late but here is the next crossing” No additional charges! Respect

My plan was to find a quiet place about 50 miles outside Calais and sleep in the car, but because of the delay I carried on driving for about 4 hours. A couple of wrong turns here and there I was doing alright!

Photo: NLP

Photo:NLP

I would like to point out I think my TomTom Navigator wants to be a WRC Co-Driver because it took me down some single track roads in the middle of nowhere with hard turns left and over crests! After kicking it up the backside I found somewhere to sleep.

Sleeping in the car was rough but I’m trying to keep the costs down. Some of you will probably say well why didn’t you fly then? Well I only managed to get funding a week before leaving so by the time I had the money flights were too expensive. I also have a massive problem with all the weight I need, like tripod as well as the 15 pairs of clothes because of the dust.

Anyways I woke up Thursday morning about 8:30, 5 miles down the road I found a McDonalds. Now I can’t speak a single word of French but I was starving. So I had to try “Hello do you speak English? Err NON” So I smiled and replied back with breakfast? Café? Please We got there in the end and I had some bacon/egg mcmuffin, result so ate that and ordered another coffee and mcmuffin.

Photo: NLP

Driving through France was a doddle; I stopped somewhere outside Bordeaux. I did bring a double inflatable bed with me so I folded down my rear seats and lay my entire luggage under the bed and set that up for a little power nap (3 hours later) I woke up! The time was about 6pm now so I carried on driving into the night.

Going through Northern Spain was a little scary, everyone was driving so fast and I didn’t fully know where I was going but made it to service station about 2am and it was time to have a sleep. Woke up the Friday morning about 7:30am absolutely freezing! It was 2c outside!!!

Packed everything back into its proper place in the car and heading off. While I was driving through Spain I was looking for a McDonalds or something to eat but there was nothing so I open my stash of Mars Bar’s, Kit Kat chunky and packs of Cheese and Onion crisps! Wasn’t the greatest breakfast but I still had 600-700 miles to do.

The miles just seem to fall away and I was in Savilla by 3pm, stopped for another little power nap and then made the last 2 hour drive to Faro! Before heading to the hotel I stopped off at the service park and took some pictures so make sure you check them out.

I can’t wait for the Rally de Portugal to start, I’ll be filming the Recce days and hope to find some testing days on Sunday/Monday so keep an eye out here and on my YouTube Channel.

Hotel has free Wi-Fi in the lobby so I should be able to edit the videos at upload of an evening.

Portugal is a fantastic place, this is only my second time here but I can’t wait to get out and see the place properly.

Photo: NLP

I know at the start of this I said a couple of words but as you have seen from this trip I don’t do anything by half’s! Heh

David!

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Mini stars to run legendary numbers

Posted on March 18, 2011 by Daniel Darrall

MINI WRC Team stars Kris Meeke and Dani Sordo will recreate history when they take part on a selected programme of world championship rallies this year.

Photo: Mini/Prodrive

They are planning to carry numbers 37 and 52 respectively on their MINI WRCs, which will be painted red with white roofs, the marque’s traditional rally colours.

MINI’s first competitive appearance in the WRC will be on Rally d’Italia Sardegna, which is scheduled to run from 5-8 May.

Providing the plan is ratified, Northern Irishman Meeke will run as number 37 with Spaniard Sordo carrying number 52. Meeke’s legendary countryman, Paddy Hopkirk, used number 37 when he won the Monte Carlo Rally in a Mini Cooper in 1964. When Mini made it back-to-back wins in the Principality with Timo Makinen the following year, the Finn ran as number 52.

MINI recently ramped up its preparations for its WRC debut when Meeke and Sordo conducted an endurance test in France. Both drivers were told to drive the Prodrive-developed MINI WRC to the point of mechanical failure in an effort to assess the durability of key components.

“It was one of the toughest places to go to in Europe for testing and was done in all extremes of weather,” said Meeke, following the three-day test in Fontjoncouse in the south of France. “It was a very constructive test because it threw up lots of little things. A massive storm came in the day before I tested so it was like a real quagmire, which was perfect for us. For example, we found out how the windscreen wipers react after a watersplash and what kind of traction we have in the wet.”

Sordo’s running took place in dry conditions, which enabled the ex-factory Citroen driver to carry out some high-speed testing.

MINI is set to formally launch its WRC bid at its Cowley manufacturing plant in Oxford, UK, on 11 April.

Credit: WRC.com

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