M-Sport Ford World Rally Teams

All this is just speculation, but I would still expect Breen to drive the Puma for the 1st time after Finland as well. However we haven't seen his contract and it might not be as watertight as full time drivers contracts can be. Is he on a pay-per-event deal or a yearly contract?

I think Malcolm let Ogier have a run in the C3 while he was under contract at Msport iirc (although that was probably with the hope Ogier would be put off by the C3).

If Msport will be running the Puma in Greece after the Acropolis, maybe Adamo has just taken the view of what difference does it really make if he let's Breen drive the car? Breen is going there anyway and will test the car soon enough regardless, and it's not like Breen is NOT going to be fully motivated to end his Hyundai career on a high in Finland. If Adamo was pissed at his elite drivers Tanak or Neuville leaving to Msport, maybe he would block a test in that case, but Breen? That's a bit different.

Finland is likely Breen's last event with Hyundai, quite likely the contract is announced after that. He might still get to do a secret test beforehand. Could also be that Hyundai ties him to the end of the year instead of letting him test the car freely before the end of the year.

Connected with that is that I find it strange MSport would test the Puma again barely 2-3 weeks after testing in Sardinia (gravel) and France (tarmac).

Anyway if Breen is leaving, I'd say Adamo has all kinds of reasons to be pissed, cause he has a real problem finding a driver for next year that won't make the team much weaker than this year.
No way Solberg is able to fight for podiums regularly next year, like Breen was (on the selected rallies), but it will likely end that way because nobody else will fit and be interested:
- Lappi would fit, but if given the choice he for sure will rather go to Toyota.
- Mikkelsen at Hyundai imo won't happen unless Adamo leaves as rumored.
- Suninnen? that's a bit long shot right now, maybe if he does well in Finland + at least one other rally before the end of the year
- the way Huttunen is threated by Adamo I doubt he will even get a chance to drive the WRC next year on some event

Anyway at least this would still apply for basically anyone but Sordo:

Quote:

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Adamo Says
'All I want next year is to nots keep hearing drivers saying - All I want is a full season next year'
#AdamoSays next year #WRC

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https://twitter.com/AdamoSays

Would be more logical to see Breen leaving and testing after Finland (especially with Spain and Monza remaining where Sordo would be more logical) but as it is human relations, it is always difficult to know.
Maybe that Hyundai considers that Breen is absolutely not a title contender on a full-time season because of his results with Citroen so they don’t care of him testing early if he has decided to leave.
Maybe it is to make some money savings for the last months of his contract.
Maybe it is to thank him for the job done.
Maybe it is to keep good relations with M-Sport for the future (Fourmaux?)
It may also help to test another driver in one of the two last rallies.

About his replacement at Hyundai, I’m not that worried for them as opportunities exists (then, the question will be if they choose the good one): Sordo remains a good option for a shared car and almost all the drivers available have a good complementarity with him for a shared car so it is a good basis to begin with (all the more with a Neuville-Tanak duo in the other cars).

Mikkelsen and Ostberg are experienced drivers and remained in WRC-2, their last part-time season in WRC was rather good (Ostberg 2018 and Mikkelsen 2019) and they are quite equal (they could take Ostberg if Mikkelsen signs with M-Sport with Breen); the only difference is that Mikkelsen knows Hyundai.
I think the situation is different than 2 years ago for Mikkelsen and Hyundai as they may need each other (for Mikkelsen, not finding a job in Rally1 next year would probably mean he will never come back).

Suninen is a bet but the fact of having Sordo may lower the risk. Let’s see what he does on Finland.

For Solberg, too early as you said but maybe Adamo has already make the choice.

They could also attempt a huge offer for Lappi (2 years contract full-time for exemple) which may beat Toyota (who gives only one-year part-time as they think about Katsuta for 2023). But if they have not do it for Breen, I don’t think they will do it for Lappi.

For sure we don't know details of driver contracts but normally full time / full season driver is contracted until Dec 31st. This might not be the case for Breen who has been offered by Hyundai only 2-5 WRC events per season. So I'm quite sure there won't be any issues for him to test Puma Rally1 car soon.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mknight

Anyway if Breen is leaving, I'd say Adamo has all kinds of reasons to be pissed, cause he has a real problem finding a driver for next year that won't make the team much weaker than this year.

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I'm not sure how pissed he can be though. This situation is his doing, so if he is pissed surely he can only really be pissed at himself?

If he was desperate to keep Breen he could've offered him a full time seat in the last few months (and I'm sure Breen would've signed - Breen has mentioned numerous times how happy he is within the team - besides being part time).

So no reason to be pissed at Breen for taking a full time seat and potentially the security of a 2yr deal, or any reason to be pissed at Msport. It's not like Malcolm has pinched Tanak or Neuville from Hyundai. So what real harm would actually come from "maybe" allowing Breen and Msport to do one test while in Greece?

Adamo seems to make split decisions based on his mood quite often, sometimes also seemingly illogical ones, so just about anything is possible.

Anyway I feel there is something more to the story, hopefully we will get details at some point. (also still a bit early to speculate too much with no confirmation).

Fourmaux splits partnership with Jamoul. Gilsoul next codriver?

What's up with these sudden co-driver changes? Quite insane amount of changes recently

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by cali

What's up with these sudden co-driver changes? Quite insane amount of changes recently

Sent from my GM1913 using Tapatalk

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My advanced theory:

In 2020 rallying stopped, lot of (co-)drivers did something else and now when rallying resumed and they went back they realized they now prefer "something else". (children, education, business w/e....) or they now don't approach rallying with same commitment level (and drivers don't like it).
In case of drivers you don't see it stand out so much, you just simply don't hear about them. In case of codrivers it's much more public cause drivers stay with different codriver.

Also co-drivers make much less money than drivers, so it might be more tempting to do something else. (or demand higher salary like Gilsoul seemingly did)