The season started off with a bang, but unfortunately not quite the bang we wanted. After the team finally decided it could go ahead with a programme in 2009 there was a lot to do, it was a busy time but now things have become clear. During that time we had a lot of press functions for the BP Ford Abu Dhabi World Rally Team in the few days left before Christmas, after the late end to the season. In the end we only had a couple of weeks to get the mind ready for the next season. We went to Ireland for a test before Rally Ireland, and this was held in County Monaghan, which is to the east of the area used by the rally, and in the Republic part of the island. We had finished the test without problems then on the Saturday evening, driving in a Mondeo on an ordinary road and we met a car coming towards us. I swerved to the left and off the road, but his car still impacted the side of our car, I managed to stop our car but the other car then overturned down the road over a fence.

Rally Ireland was not in the world championship in 2008, but in fact it isonly some 15 month since we were here tackling the 2007 Rally Ireland. That was an event run in incredible weather conditions, but it was good for us, as we got our first podium result and of course our best result on asphalt. The weather this year was still very challenging. Until the day before recce started there was snow lying on several stages, and the FIA allowed us to choose between two types of tarmac tyre, a tarmac tyre and a snow tyre, to suit the conditions. You have to brake earlier, you need to be more careful in the corners, and if you have chosen to drive with the snow tyre, the tyres will be moving around beneath you to a greater extent. You had to find a way to drive the car when it is not on the balance all the time.

There are not many changes to the rules this year except for the smaller calendar with 12 instead of 15 events. We were relieved shortly before the rally when the FIA cancelled their new rule which allowed each team only to have one safety crew. Finally came a new bulletin we could again have two crews, one crew per rally car in the team in the P1 and P2. That was a very good decision. The problem is that the pacenotes these days are very individual, even though they are in the same language. Mikko for instance, has descriptive notes, I use a number system. For any gravel crew it is very demanding and time consuming work, and I do not think it could ever have worked if one crew had to try to correct the notes of two different crews.

I had a very surprising start in Ireland. Really, I had set out to aim for maybe fourth place in the beginning, and maybe finishing up third or fourth, and when we reached the end of the first stage we found we were leading by 17 seconds! Then everything collapsed for us. The conditions were extremely difficult, everywhere there was water on the road because of heavy rain and then on a long left hand corner we found another large puddle, hidden from view as we went into the corner by a grass bank. When I hit the water our Ford Focus RS WRC07 went a little bit sideways, I corrected for this and the car went towards the inside of the corner, and of course there was a rock hidden there. I hit it with the front suspension. We had a puncture and damaged the suspension, but were able to carry on and finish the stage, and just as we crossed the finish the front suspension collapsed totally. We tried to repair the damage on the road section but even with straps we could not succeed. Of course our team boss Malcolm Wilson was not best pleased as you can imagine. Visions went through his mind that after losing the Manufacturers' title in 2008 he wanted to get back at Citroen again and I had screwed up everything for him.

We got a couple of points for our BP Ford Abu Dhabi team by restarting the really and driving the Saturday and Sunday stages. The team meanwhile had obviously detuned the engine, because by the FIA rules this engine has to do more rallies, and there was no sense in stressing the engine more than necessary.

3mmm