Cork International Rally : Citroën Sport - FinishTo optimise its preparation for November's Rally Ireland (Nov. 15-18), Citroën Sport entered two cars for this weekend's Cork International Rally. Victory went to
Sebastien Loeb and Daniel Elena at the wheel of their C4 WRC,
while Dani Sordo/Marc Martí finished second in a Xsara WRC.
The Citroën crews were pleasantly surprised to be greeted by sunshine for their maiden visit to the asphalt lanes of the south of Ireland. With the exception of the shakedown, which took place in showery weather, the 14 stages totalling 239km were practically entirely dry, with only Saturday morning's loop still damp from the previous day's rain.
Sebastien Loeb and Daniel Elena posted practically every fastest time to secure their second win of the year with the C4 WRC in Ireland following their success in Donegal in June. "In addition to winning," commented Seb at the finish, "the most important thing about the weekend was the fact that it enabled us to do some excellent work in a competitive context. Thanks to our experience in Donegal, we had a fairly shrewd idea of what we would find here, although I must say I was once again surprised by how difficult the stages were. It really wasn't easy to make good notes with just two passes during recce."
"The weekend gave us a valuable opportunity to test with Citroën Sport's engineers and technicians for Ireland's WRC round which will be based in Sligo. The stages we contested here on Saturday were apparently similar to what we can expect in the north, so it was very worthwhile coming to Cork.
The rally also enabled us to work on certain points and validate our previous work in other areas. We have kept some set-ups, rejected others and also evaluated certain new ideas…"
At each service halt, the atmosphere within the Citroën Sport camp was relaxed but studious. The large crowd of enthusiastic onlookers was able to see the crews and technical staff locked in conversation as they analysed the findings of the previous stages before making adjustments to the set-up for the following tests. The copious notes and observations collected in the course of the weekend promise to be a gold mine of data to help the team prepare for the penultimate round of the 2007 World Rally Championship.
Dani Sordo and Marc Martí opted for a slightly slower pace, although they were consistently in the wake of their team-mates to ensure a one-two finish for Citroën and the Spanish pair was upbeat about its maiden experience of the Irish stages. "As soon as we started recce," smiled Dani after the podium ceremony, "I realised what a good idea it had been to come and do this event. The stages were very fast but it's the fact that they're so narrow and bumpy that makes them such a challenge. It wasn't easy to make good pacenotes and we occasionally found the car jumping in places where we hadn't expected it to! It is really very different from anything else I know."
"More than our actual performance," concluded the Spaniard, "we concentrated above all on getting a feel for the terrain. I hope the experience and the lessons we go away with will be profitable. I was also able to evaluate the different set-ups that we should be able to use. Last but not least, I was really impressed by the huge popular following rallying enjoys in this country. That was terrific to see…"
Cork International Rally : Final Standing
1 Loeb-Elena Citroën C4 WRC 2h02'09"5
2 Sordo-Martí Citroën Xsara WRC + 2'21"5
3 Higgins-Kennedy Subaru Impreza WRC + 4'59"8
4 Donnelly-Kiely Subaru Impreza WRC + 5'43"2
5 Hirvonen-Lehtinen Ford Focus WRC + 7'29"0
6 Boland-Regan Subaru Impreza WRC + 8'34"7
7 McNulty-O'Donnell Subaru Impreza WRC + 9'31"3
8 McHale-Duffy Ford Focus WRC + 11'25"5
9 Barrable-O'Gorman Ford Focus WRC + 12'58"5
10 McHale-Parry Ford Focus WRC + 14'03"6
Citroën Sport
