TOYOTA GAZOO Racing WRT

[AnttiL]

Martin mentioned that he doesn't see Toyota as "factory" team. I would guess this has to do with trying to earn money (see Tänak's Sardinia steering issue). Real factory team has results as only focus.

I thought it referred to the actual setup with Tommi Mäkinen Racing building and running the cars and just being funded by the Toyota factory as opposed to Citroen and Hyundai where the teams are/were owned by the factory?

[drive]

And how many point did meeke or latvala brought this year in 'the fastest car' in comparison to 'unproven' evans in a slower ford?.... that said, maybe Toyota wasnt THE fastest, just tanak was the fastest, as his teammates didnt shine on points scoring... well, we'll see next year, dont we?

[mknight]

He'll happily play number two to Ogier and bag manufacturer points.

The risky part with Evans is that he basically never ever drove a different car than an MSport one, be it R5 or WRC.

[Portimao]

According Ogier, why did he actually leave M-Sport for Citroen last year?

[AnttiL]

I disagree. Katsuta's program is supposedly all European events and Japan. For sure it's cheaper for Toyota to deploy five cars on an European event than four cars overseas. Besides, Latvala is probably funding his drives somehow. Five rallies could be what he has budget for, or what resources Toyota can offer.

And like I guessed, Latvala says here he needs to start gathering sponsors and the more budget he can get, the more rallies he can drive.

https://www.rallit.fi/jari-matti-lat...ut-unohdetaan/

He mentions Sweden and Finland, as well as Portugal, Sardegna and Wales.

[AnttiL]

I'm not sure if this is something only said to Finnish press but Mäkinen says that "we haven't decided on a number one driver, everyone is on the same line (equal)"

https://yle.fi/urheilu/3-11076111

[EstWRC]

According Ogier, why did he actually leave M-Sport for Citroen last year?

if i remember correctly then public ones where lack of money from Wilson to pay for Ogier and not enough support from Ford (not being a factory team, Ogier was very vocal about it especially in 2018, how ironic it sounds now after his year in citroen)

[dimviii]

I'm not sure if this is something only said to Finnish press but Mäkinen says that "we haven't decided on a number one driver, everyone is on the same line (equal)"

https://yle.fi/urheilu/3-11076111

maybe this is targeting to Tanak/Martin requirements?

[meh]

The risky part with Evans is that he basically never ever drove a different car than an MSport one, be it R5 or WRC.

It was kind of the same with Tänak before going to Toyota from M-Sport

[meh]

maybe this is targeting to Tanak/Martin requirements?

Based on Märtin's interview, there wasn't any no 1 requirement - and there was no need for that.