Germany : Stobart M-Sport Ford - FinishRound ten of the FIA World Rally Championship, ADAC Rallye Deutschland, has proved to be a successful points catch for the Stobart VK M-Sport Ford rally team. Both nominated points-scoring crews, Jari-Matti Latvala/Miikka Anttila and
Henning Solberg/Cato Menkerud, have scored points for the team with Latvala bagging himself a drivers point to boot.
In total the team earned five manufacturers' points, still well in the race for a podium spot in the Manufacturers' Championship sitting just three points behind Japanese manufacturer Subaru. Latvala's eighth place overall means he claims his first ever drivers' point on tarmac. Topping things off, Matthew Wilson/Michael Orr drove extremely well to finish ninth overall, their best asphalt result to-date.
Twenty-two world rally cars drove through the historical Porta Nigra, an ancient Roman gate in the heart of Trier, as the second tarmac rally for 2007 got underway. Weather conditions, unlike previous years, stayed fairly dry as crews took on the 356.27 kilometres of asphalt action.
The event setting was south-west Germany based in the rich winery region of Trier. All three legs offered a mixed bag with the opening based through vineyards north of Rally HQ, the second in the famous Baumholder military range and the final day over tricky closed road stages alongside the Moselle River.
On his 50th WRC start Solberg began the event which he was contesting for the first time in his nine year WRC career. Things began cautiously for the Norwegian as he looked to gain maximum experience miles on just his third ever tarmac rally. Unfortunately an incident 2.3 kilometres into stage 5 retired him from leg 1 when an impact under braking damaged the suspension of his Stobart Ford Focus RS WRC06.
Leg 2 proved to be a similar story when, again on the penultimate test, Erzweiler, the Norwegian came unstuck when he hit a large rock with the right wheel breaking the suspension and immediately retiring him from the day. Fortunately his final leg was much more positive setting two top-ten stage times over the final two stages of the rally.
Latvala used the opening leg to regain his confidence on tarmac with his last rally on the surface back in January for Rallye Monte Carlo. His Saturday began extremely well setting two top-six stage times as he started to feel more comfortable with the car moving to seventh outright.
However, during the next stage, Panzerplatte, he encountered problems as he didn't have time to check the tyre pressures before the start of the stage. This resulted in a loss of grip as well as valuable seconds. Still the young Finn battled back strong over the third leg to finish with the final drivers' point.
British driver Wilson also used the first day as a learning curb on his second Rally Germany outing, getting through without any major issues apart from a big moment on the 23.04 kilometre second stage when an ambitious cut bounced his Focus RS onto two wheels nearly flipping it over itself.
Leg's 2 and 3 worked better for the youngster but the changing surface and damp sections of tarmac caused slight problems with his pacenote system. Still it was a sterling performance and a confidence boosting experience ahead of the 3 reaming tarmac rallies in the 2007 season.
Stobart Motorsport's Barry Clark and co-driver Scott Martin have claimed their first ever international championship by winning the 2007 Fiesta SportingTrophy International at this weekend's ADAC Rally Deutschland. Clark has shown a phenomenal dominance over the FSTi series winning all five rounds this year, powering to championship victory with two rounds to spare.
Stobart M-Sport Ford
