Quote Originally Posted by focus206 View Post
He struggles to drive in the traffic because he's a rally driver. And nonetheless, he managed to be on pace with Yvan Muller. But even if he would have been much worse, in both touring car racing and rallycross, how does that influence how good of a RALLY driver he is?
About the easy competition, I do not agree. Gronholm was a great driver, Solberg as well. Hirvonen in his prime was very good also thanks to his consistency, and let's not forget McRae, Sainz and in part Makinen who yes, were in the last years of their careers, but they were still fast as it was proven in the final standings of those years. Much more competition than Ogier had in last years, for example.
Also that Citroen was like Ferrari, I do not agree. In 2004 and 2005 it was the best car but not by a great margin, where was Duval with his speed (when he wasn't crashing)? Then in 2006 he won, still using the old Xsara against the new Focus, even after skipping 4 rounds. In 2007, 2008 and in part 2009, the Focus wasn't inferior to the C4, at least not by a great margin. I'd say only 2009 and 2010 were "easy" titles to win, and even in 2009 Hirvonen fought until the last round thanks to his consistency. And 2012 too, but because of others' faults, Hirvonen not being able to match Loeb's pace, while Latvala and Solberg literally mistook everything they could mistake in the works Fiestas.
Yes, Loeb is terrible at racing in traffic. And in the WTCC was Loeb behind both his team mates Muller and Lopez, While in Rallycross RX he is behind his team mate Timmy Hansen. And i found it funny when he last year said that he would consider quitting Rallycross after 2018 if not the dominance of the VWs of Kristoffersson and Solberg leveled out in 2018, While neither Loeb himself nor any of his competitors said nothing like that during the dominance of Citroen where Loeb had an easy ride to his 9 straight WRC titles. And if you ask me the only years where there was great drivers with good cars who was capable of challenging Loeb & Citroen was in 2004,05,06 and 07. Between 2008-2012 Loeb literally had no serious competition. And like i said Loeb is an amazing driver, But he is also heavily overrated in my opinion.