JWRC and PWRC preview

Publicat in: January 29, 2009, Vizualizari: 42

After entries had closed for the first two rounds of the 2009 world rally championship event, the FIA has released the initial list of competitors entered in the 2009 Production Car and Junior world championships. These lists are still provisional, because they will remain open till the 24th February, when entries for round four (Portugal), the final chance for competitors in either series to start their season, eventually close. Details about the individual nominated events (six out of eight) will not be released until the final closure of entries.

At the moment only nine entries are on the JWRC list, seven of whom have entered the opening round. The JWRC season in 2009 starts with Rally Ireland (end of January) which is unusually early for this series (in 2008 it was the end of February, in 2007 the middle of February) but it is believed for this reason than several more entries will arrive. The main importance in 2009 is that Citroen will revert to promoting rallying in France so they are not continuing with their world championship "C2 Junior Experience" promotion and have stopped their official supported C2 Super1600 team in the JWRC. This means that there is only one strong Citroen entry in the JWRC, the C2 S1600 entered by Czech National Team for Martin Prokop. Ranged against him will be several officially supported Suzuki Swift S1600s, headed by Aaron Burkart, Michal Kosciuszko and Didier Auriol's protege Yoann Bonato. The KNAF Dutch federation team is back again with two entries, same drivers as last year with Weijs driving a C2 Super 1600 for the first time.

Still the more popular of the two subsidiary series is the Production Car series. With more than five weeks to go before the lists close, already six private entries and 13 team entries are confirmed. Once again, more entries are confidently expected, and the total is expected to be not far from the full house received in 2008. Mitsubishi and Subaru cars are expected to dominate the series, but currently the only regular Super 2000 car is expected to be the Skoda of 2006 Junior champion Patrik Sandell run by the 2008 championship winning BRR team, while the Czech driver Tarabus expects to make occasional appearances in a Fiat. Notable absences from the list at this time include the 2008 champion Andreas Aigner, whose agreed five year programme with Red Bull ended on a very high note, and 2006 champion Nasser Al-Attiyah. One special characteristic of the entry is the international combination for car number 44 which will be shared between drivers from Czech Republic and Cyprus and who share their names in the entry title. Other international liaisons continue. The Ralliart New Zealand Mitsubishi team runs the Norwegian driver Eyvind Brynildsen, the Russian Uspensky Subaru team has confirmed they will run the Swedish driver Patrik Flodin and plan also to run the Norwegian Andreas Mikkelsen. Mikkelsen will compete in Rally Norway as one of the two "Guest" entries. Two of the Pirelli Star Drivers selected last year for the six funded drives in 2009 (four of which coincide with the PCWRC) also plan to contest the full PCWRC, Martin Semerad and Mark Tapper.

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