[WRC] News & Rumours (part V) 2017

[mmm]

Well it was mentioned somewhere that Wilson is supposed to have a meeting with Ford at the end of September. If this is true then there will be few quiet weeks ahead..

[stefanvv]

I would blame this part combined with the VW exit getting known after all drivers had signed.

Even if you don't like Mikkelsen you have to admit he is among the top 6 drivers with best results for last 2 years (Ogier, Latvala, Tanak, Neuville, Meeke are the others). There are 12 factory seats now. Out of these 6 "other" drivers surely there will always be some that don't perform on a few rallies.

I dare say that if Latvala ended without a drive in 2017 it would be him jumping in and replacing drivers in very much the same way.

Mikkelsen clearly showed in Germany it was not the VW team was dominating "by miles" previous years. That puts many calculations wrong I guess. But, may be there was just that spark of "getting a chance" again, may be not. However Hyundai getting him that early is probably also a two way target - help Neuville to achieve his goal, and/or binding him for 2018 season. They won't be the losers at the end.....

[mknight]

That it was not just the car at VW was clear after Monte (in both WRC and R5) and Sweden in (WRC) were won by ex. VW drivers.

Hence why I claim that if it wasn't Mikkelsen replacing drivers and Latvala was without a seat he would be replacing them as instead.

But yes before the start of 2017 I can see that a few managers could have doubted how much the car had to say. Certainly in 2013-2014 the Polo was far faster, not so much last year.

[dimviii]

http://www.rallysportmag.com.au/home...ox-rule-change

[Essaj]

http://www.rallysportmag.com.au/home...ox-rule-change

Thank god

[GravelBen]

But yes before the start of 2017 I can see that a few managers could have doubted how much the car had to say. Certainly in 2013-2014 the Polo was far faster, not so much last year.

It was still clearly the fastest, strongest and most reliable car last year, just the advantage was smaller than the miles ahead it was in 2013-2015.

[GravelBen]

Mikkelsen clearly showed in Germany it was not the VW team was dominating "by miles" previous years.

Mikkelsen showed in Germany that the Citroen is competitive on tarmac, which we already knew. He also showed in Poland that it isn't so competitive on gravel, which we also already knew.

Anyone with eyes could see how dominant the VW team was from 2013-2015 (and to a lesser degree 2016), Mikkelsen's drives this year have told us nothing new about that.

[stefanvv]

Mikkelsen showed in Germany that the Citroen is competitive on tarmac

Loeb disagrees with You it is competitive on wet asphalt. I can't say anything about it.

[AnttiL]

OK, so sorting the deal with Citroen can wait... despite saying over and over he wants his future decided early ...

We'll see who's right.

Maybe his manager has been at full work all the time. This is the only part of the year when drivers can get the vacation.

But of course it's fun to speculate if Ogier took a detour in Dearborn

[Archie Gillaine]

Maybe his manager has been at full work all the time. This is the only part of the year when drivers can get the vacation.

But of course it's fun to speculate if Ogier took a detour in Dearborn

When I saw the photo on Twitter, I did think similar....though probably wrongly....