Travis Pastrana

[koko0703]

So the WRC debut for Travis Pastrana is over, and he finished repectable 5th in PWRC although he's a massive 8 mins behind PWRC winner Mark Higgins and the final standing is more of the result of a small entry list than his performance. Still considering this is his first time in Group N car and with using pace note, I must say this result shows a great effort by Travis.

Now question is how far he can go from here. He is scheduled to contest Argentina and GB this year and will enter full PWRC for 2008 & 2009. So by the end of 2009, will he be ready to move on to the top level??? It would be great for US rallying scene to have an American driver in the top level, and WRC will welcome more attention from USA!! ....and 2009 is coincide with the end of Petter's contract with Subaru, too

So what do you guys think??? I know it's way too early to draw any conclusion, but Pastrana in SWRT in 2010???

[L5->R5/CR]

So the WRC debut for Travis Pastrana is over, and he finished repectable 5th in PWRC although he's a massive 8 mins behind PWRC winner Mark Higgins and the final standing is more of the result of a small entry list than his performance. Still considering this is his first time in Group N car and with using pace note, I must say this result shows a great effort by Travis.

Now question is how far he can go from here. He is scheduled to contest Argentina and GB this year and will enter full PWRC for 2008 & 2009. So by the end of 2009, will he be ready to move on to the top level??? It would be great for US rallying scene to have an American driver in the top level, and WRC will welcome more attention from USA!! ....and 2009 is coincide with the end of Petter's contract with Subaru, too

So what do you guys think??? I know it's way too early to draw any conclusion, but Pastrana in SWRT in 2010???

I think it will be important to see how he improves for Argentina. In Mexico he ran where most of us in the US expected him too. But he kept his nose clean and finished (there are some more experienced and faster drivers that can't say the same). Still, 1.25second/km is a lot. Hopefully after the debrief they can identify some places where he is loosing time and cut that margin by Argentina, and again in GB, steady progress and getting experience is what this season is supposed to be all about.

All in all I think he did what everybody expected. Put in a respectable time, but didn't set the world on fire. He'll probably finish lower in the order in Argentina but hopefully with less of a gap per KM.

It will be interesting to see how the Argentinian fans respond to Travis as well. The Mexican fans seemed to not be able to get enough of him.

[Tomi]

I think he did as expected, and also think he needs a lot of serious rallying, driving in us series he dont find it, the level there simply is too low, also driving a few rallies on world level now and then does not help much I belive.
But now he knows what the pace is.

[A.F.F.]

Travis did good in Mexico. PWRC is tougher this year than in many years before. If he can drive to the points in rallies it will be very good

[SubaruNorway]

Travis doing a no hander landing on sunday, when can we expect the first double backflip

http://rally.subaru.com/event_2007_mexico_gallery.html

[WRXedUSA]

Not even a mention an any of the news/sports channels last night.

Rally is still "underground" and will remain so for the remainder of Travis' 3yr stint in the top level of the sport.

[bt52b]

Probably needs to do pacenote rallies (in Europe?) for the rest of the year if he is serious about the PWRC campaign in 2008.

[FrankenSchwinn]

Probably needs to do pacenote rallies (in Europe?) for the rest of the year if he is serious about the PWRC campaign in 2008.

send him to finland to see how real men have fun with their pants on.... nah, i mean, seriously, he should really have tried to have a go at the finnish rally this year.

[Doug Woods]

So the WRC debut for Travis Pastrana is over, and he finished repectable 5th in PWRC although he's a massive 8 mins behind PWRC winner Mark Higgins and the final standing is more of the result of a small entry list than his performance. Still considering this is his first time in Group N car and with using pace note, I must say this result shows a great effort by Travis.

Now question is how far he can go from here. He is scheduled to contest Argentina and GB this year and will enter full PWRC for 2008 & 2009. So by the end of 2009, will he be ready to move on to the top level??? It would be great for US rallying scene to have an American driver in the top level, and WRC will welcome more attention from USA!! ....and 2009 is coincide with the end of Petter's contract with Subaru, too

So what do you guys think??? I know it's way too early to draw any conclusion, but Pastrana in SWRT in 2010???

Very difficult to predict what he will achieve, but I offer the following:

1) He has a very competent team behind him who have charted a realistic path of progression for him in the WRC;

2) He is only 23 years old;

3) He is only in his third year of rallying;

4) He is very smart;

5) He has been in the spot light since he was 14 years old;

6) He is used to being the best in the world and what he does; and

7) He wants to be the best rally driver in the world.

Where will he be by 2010? Probably in a WRC car, but whether it is a factory car or a private team remains to be seen.

[SubaruNorway]

Didn't his team manager Derek used to work for the Mitshubishi world rally team http://rally.subaru.com/event_2007_1..._gallery2.html