Inside Rally

WorldRX:Gronholm’s Hyundai RX lead a 1-2 over night

Posted on June 15, 2019 by Daniel Darrall

An incredibly strong day 1 of World Rallycross at Hell in Norway, for Gronholm’s privately ran pair if Hyundai i20’s.

As the ex-WRC works cars dominated Saturday’s two Qualifying rounds. Niclas Gronholm, who missed the last two rounds, due to surgery, leads he way, with team mate & Russian driver Timur Timerzyanov. DTM legend, Timo Scheider is third. World RX, fan favourites & home boy, Andreas Bakkerud holds 4th place, with Timmy Hansen a close 5th. Making his debut in World RX, Kevin Abbring is currently 9th with Liam Doran in 12th place.

Photos from the days action below. By Daniel Darrall

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World RX – UK’s Silverstone Speed Machine in Pictures

Posted on May 27, 2019 by Daniel Darrall

Thousands of British fan’s flocked to Silverstone for Round 4 of the FIA World Rallycross Championship at Speed Machine festival. To watch all the thrills, spills, crashes, jumps & wheel to wheel action over Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday’s action was dominated by Timmy Hansen and his Peugeot 208 based, 600bhp rocket-ship as he took both qualifying rounds. Sunday’s two Qualifying rounds were then dominated by fan’s favourite Andreas Bakkerud in his Audi S1, as he took the win in both Q3 & 4. British driver’s Liam Doran, team mate to Bakkerud in the S1 and Oliver Bennett both pleased the home crowd by making it into the semi finals. Which was a first for Bennett and his Xcite Mini. However, Bennett’s Mini caught fire during his Semi-final race and had to retire.

The final gave way to an epic battle between RX rivals Timmy Hansen & Andreas Bakkerud. Both seemed very level on pace throughout the weekend. But Timmy, after an early joker, managed to take the win over Bakkerud, who suffered small issues with his handbrake around the hairpin. Anton Marklund took his first podium for GCK in the Renault Megane RS.

Check out all the action from WorldRX at Silverstone, in the InsideRally photo Album below. (Photography by Daniel Darrall)

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Mr.Hollywood Petter Solberg Takes Up Retirement

Posted on April 10, 2019 by Daniel Darrall

After 20 years of top level competition and winning three FIA Titles (2003 World Rally Champion, 2014 & ’15 World RallyCross Champion) Rally super star & fan favourite, Petter Solberg has announced this morning that he will retire from top level Motorsport.

Solberg, dubbed Mr.Hollywood for his flamboyant style in entertaining the fans during race/rally weekends, started his career at Ford alongside Colin McRae, before joining Subaru to take his first win in Wales Rally GB in 2002 with his Welsh Co-Driver Phil Mills. The pair went on to take the WRC title the following year once again in wales rally GB, beating Sebastien Loeb by just 1 point, as well as the likes of Carlos Sainz, Colin McRae, Richard Burns & team mate Tommi Makinen.

In 2008, Subaru pulled out of the sport, leaving Solberg with out a drive. So the Norwegian set up his own rally team, and has competed with them ever since. In 2013 he then switched over to the World Rallycross Championships where he won the title in 2014 & 2015. In 2017 he joined forces with Volkswagen, where his team went on to win both the drivers and manufacturers championships two years in a row. Despite Solberg suffering from illness during much of late 2017 & early 2018. His team then announced they would pause their WorldRX program for 2019 due to lack of manufacturer team to compete against as World RX struggles with the uncertainty of future electric car competition.

However, Solberg say he will not “hang up the helmet. Not completely.” As he will still do selected events for fun as well as a ‘farewell tour’ which according to Autosport, will begin at Goodwood’s Festival of Speed in the UK.

“It’s 20 years and that’s a long time to do something and then decide to stop,” Solberg told Autosport.

“I want to do cool stuff, I want to do the right, high-profile events in the future. Maybe I go and do Rally Sweden, for example, or if I have an invite to go back to Rallyday, I take these kinds of promotional things.

“My driving makes people smile, I want to carry on with that. “But for the championship, I’m finished. I won’t do another one.”