Barum Czech Rally Zlin 2021

[Walach]

Cais already testing the other Fiesta from his team around Biskupice airfield (SS 11/14 yesterday).
Not wasting time, aren’t they?

[er88]

Was so impressed with Cais. Brilliant speed which surpised me and it was heartbreaking the way it ended. Crew were absolutely distraught, but hopefully they can use this experience to kick on now.

Kopecky, lacked a bit of pace but was also using his head in the tricky conditions. Knew he was beaten on speed but rallies aren't solely won with speed - as Cais showed on the last stage.

Mikkelsen...., feel like I say this after nearly every rally of his this season, but again unimpressive.

[mknight]

Mikkelsen was 0.2s behind lead after first loop and ahead of Cais.

Then on the more muddy second loop drove safely and ended 2nd ( would have been 3rd). Getting a decent lead in ERC.
Which is exactly what I predicted in this very thread after Lukyanuk crashed out beforehand.

Again this feels similar to Estonia, "everyone" predicts he will do bad. Then he does much better (here that means actually fighting with Kopecky) and the same guys that predicted he will do much worse call it a disappointment.

Btw. last time a non-Czech driver won Barum is Hanninen in 2012. Lukyanuk didn't manage in multiple tries, Sordo ended 3rd in 2018.

[Lead]

Mikkelsen...., feel like I say this after nearly every rally of his this season, but again unimpressive.

Outside his early season comments about "dominating" every rally he enters (now everyone just loves to rub that statement in his face at every moment possible), overall he did a clever, smart rally. On the first day he was on the same pace as local drivers Cais and Kopecky. Thats actually not bad considering it was 10 years ago since he drove in Barum. As Cais and Kopecky battle heated up (Pindula night stage), it seemed he simply backed off realizing the risk is just too high to end crashing out when his main title contender is taking 0 points out of the weekend. So thats just that.

About Mikkelsen's early season comments - it simply shows how important is to re-think twice what you are about to say in social media and how other people will interpret this. I dont think he meant to sound arrogant (or is arrogant personality itself), but thats how it sounded to most people and now everyone just loves to highlight it in a negative way.

[Fast Eddie WRC]

Mikkelsen thinks he is dominating ...

Andreas Mikkelsen @AMikkelsenRally
P2 Second place (Barum) and now LEADING both the World Rally Championship 2 and the European Rally Championship !

[Lead]

Mikkelsen thinks he is dominating ...

Andreas Mikkelsen @AMikkelsenRally
P2 Second place (Barum) and now LEADING both the World Rally Championship 2 and the European Rally Championship !

Thats your interpretation of what he thinks. I see that tweet has nothing to do with domination. He is leading both championships and that is a fact.

[tommeke_B]

Mikkelsen's big mouth has set the expectations too high for himself. This is a quote from an interview with Dirtfish at the start of the season:

And I have one aim next year, and that is to dominate completely every rally that I’m doing. That means win every ERC round, win every WRC2 round. That’s my sole focus next year, to be the fastest R5 car in every rally.

So far in WRC2 he has 2 wins (one where you can say he was dominating, Monte Carlo) on 5 events. In ERC he has 0 wins out of 4 events. He's not doing bad, but he's nowhere near what he said he wanted to do, despite being in the best position of all drivers competing in the same class.

[Mirek]

Kopecky says Cais had crossed tires:

https://youtu.be/9eFnGVUxQOo

I stand corrected.

[Mirek]

Cais already testing the other Fiesta from his team around Biskupice airfield (SS 11/14 yesterday).
Not wasting time, aren’t they?

I'm pretty sure, that's for psychological reasons

[Mirek]

Onboard of Kopecký from the last stage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r9soRkVsDE