Rally Bulgaria - Citroen Sport - FinishA polished performance from Simon Jean-Joseph and Jack Boyère this weekend saw the Citroën C2 Super 1600 crew pocket the silver medal in Bulgaria, where they figured amongst the top challengers from start to finish and even succeeded
in claiming two fastest stage times.
The programme of the second day of the sixth round of the 2007 European Rally Championship (ERC) featured six stages. "They were basically the same tests as yesterday (Saturday), but run in the other direction," explained Simon.
"There were two stages that weren't really to our advantage, namely SS8 and SS10. They called for frequent hard re-acceleration and I tried to keep it as smooth as possible in order to keep timeloss to a minimum. On all the other stages, however, I pushed as hard as I could and that approach ended up paying," he added.
After completing the first day in third place, the Citroën driver pulled out of Sunday morning's parc ferme in Borovetz intent on defending his position and doing all he could to gain ground on the leader.
"During recce, I sensed that the Citroën C2 S1600 had the capacity to score a top result here. I was extremely motivated before the start and I was also intent on having fun with the car because I knew it could be competitive on this type of terrain. I wasn't wrong," Simon was happy to report.
As predicted, Simon dropped a little time on SS8 and SS10 but he was in emphatic form over all the other tests and even succeeded in securing his second fastest stage time of the weekend on SS12: "After our fastest time yesterday (Saturday), it's been another great day. PH Sport did an excellent job and the C2 S1600 ran like clockwork. It's been remarkably reliable all weekend and the set-up we found in association with the technical staff from Citroën Sport meant a podium finish was always on the cards."
The C2 S1600's tell-tale bark, its ability to scrap with the four-wheel drive machinery, as well as the Martinique-based driver's assertive performance and availability ensure that the Citroën crew driver and his diminutive S1600 were a big hit with the Bulgarian spectators.
"We've had a great weekend," enthused Simon. "It was exactly the sort of rally I like, and that's nice because it's been some time since I last had that impression. Second place here means a good crop of ERC points for us and we are back in contention for the championship since we are now fourth."
"It's an excellent result," declared Citroën Sport's Customer Competition Manager Yves Matton. "Simon Jean-Joseph, Jack Boyère and PH Sport did a first-class job. They succeeded in exploiting the Citroën C2 Super 1600's potential to take the fight to the four-wheel drive runners, and that was simply remarkable. The characteristics of this event didn't really suit our car on paper but the combination of its competitiveness and the experience and skill of Simon enabled us to stage an upset."
Source Citroen Sport
