M-Sport Ford World Rally Teams

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Originally Posted by deephouse

Comparing Lappi and Suninen is total nonsense. Lappi shows tremendous step up right away while Suninen seems to struggle more and more. Right now maybe Lappi did a mistake to come to Citroen, but he is more capable of challenging for title than Suninen will ever be. Just wait.

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Lappi and Suninen started driving WRC at almost same time (2 rallies difference) so they are the two most natural ones to compare. This year Suninen ended 9th with 89 points and Lappi 10th with 83. In stage wins it's 7 to 6 for Lappi.

There are differences for sure, but even last year at Toyota Lappi was going slightly backwards. He had good results in first half of the season but when Toyota upgraded the car and became clearly fastest in the second half of the season Lappi just moved backwards. Sure his move to Citroen was decided just before that and could have an effect. At Citroen he has the most extremely mixed record possible. Great pace in 3 rallies, and no pace + crashes in 10 others.

Suninen has a bit of an opposite trend with mediocre start and slowly improving (specially on tarmac).

Therefore right now I don't see a huge difference between them. "Future potential" is just speculation at this point. One thing they have in common (that imo comes down to experience) is the issues they have in rallies outside Europe. For last two years they are regularly among the last WRCs, minutes behind or crash.

This brings us back to my main point, which is not a Lappi/Suninen comparison: MSport should have one experienced fast driver and they did have one in recent years. (Evans in 2019, Ogier in 2017-2018, Østberg in 2016). Last time they lacked one was in 2015, which was quite bad year and first in a two year decline. As it looks now history might repeat itself.

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Originally Posted by mknight

Lappi and Suninen started driving WRC at almost same time (2 rallies difference) so they are the two most natural ones to compare. This year Suninen ended 9th with 89 points and Lappi 10th with 83. In stage wins it's 7 to 6 for Lappi.

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Suninen was driving the car which won the previous two world titles and Lappi was driving the car which the guy who won those two titles abandoned after one year.

Lappi had a bad year for sure but I feel with the right environment and a good car he has more potential than Suninen who seems ‘solid’ but hasn’t really shown anything special over the last couple of years.

Of course M-Sport wanta to do well, but without one of the Big 3 driver's they arent going to be able to fight for Championships. Plus the competition is mega-tough against the huge budget Asian teams.

Therefore it makes sense to hire young drivers with potential and ambiton and some sponsors rather than older guys who arent going to win anything now. Suninen & Lappi plus GG/Pontus is ideal.

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

Therefore it makes sense to hire young drivers with potential and ambiton and some sponsors rather than older guys who arent going to win anything now. Suninen & Lappi plus GG/Pontus is ideal.

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To show or realize potential these drivers need a competitive package and someone for comparison.

Evans wouldn't be able to go to Toyota if he didn't show race winning speed in Corsica but "only" beat his inexperienced teammates. Similarly Tanak went to Toyota both because he won rallies in 2017 and because he was often faster than Ogier.

For a perfect anti-example look at Finland this year. Suninen was slowest factory WRC except Greensmith, but nobody could say whether it was his own fault, car being slow or setup being bad. He himself said he missed someone to help with car setup. Then you had Greensmith who was the slowest WRC but only had Suninen as reference in same car.

If the package is not competitive and there is no driver to compare with the new guys will rather drive WRC2 (where MSport isn't the fastest) or other semi-factory teams or try to get to Toyota/Hyundai etc.
Btw. Rovanpera is a great recent example, instead of going semi-pay route with MSport in 2019, he stayed in WRC2 spot at Skoda and now went directly to Toyota, bypassing MSport business model.
O. Solberg seems to be heading in the same direction as well at the moment (WRC2 with factory support).

To be very precise, right now ideal lineup for MSport from my view would be Lappi, Suninen, and Latvala or Mikkelsen (Paddon would work too, but he doesn't want) with Greensmith doing a few drives on his own money. But it actually looks like both Latvala and Mikkelsen prefer to do a few rallies at Toyota/Hyundai instead of having to bring budget to MSport, which in the end is a loss for both sides.

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Originally Posted by mknight

But it actually looks like both Latvala and Mikkelsen prefer to do a few rallies at Toyota/Hyundai instead of having to bring budget to MSport, which in the end is a loss for both sides.

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This.

Mikkelsen is the only one i would have picked over Lappi. Perhaps less future potential but on the other hand more experienced now. Feel both could give their careers a boost with a change of team/car.

So, team will be announced ONLY in Autosport International.

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Originally Posted by Andre Oliveira

So, team will be announced ONLY in Autosport International.

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Surely they will announce before then.. maybe just livery at the Autosport show?

Otherwise when are they planning to go testing?

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Originally Posted by Andre Oliveira

So, team will be announced ONLY in Autosport International.

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Surely the Monte entry list will be released well before then


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