M-Sport Ford World Rally Teams

[Rallyper]

They don't have to nominate three drivers. I think we saw this case in Acropolis 2021 when Serderidis was the third Fiesta WRC but not running for manu points.

Of course they will if they only bring three cars, Serderidis included.Why compare to Acropolis 2021, anyway? Now is 2023 season coming...

[AnttiL]

Of course they will if they only bring three cars, Serderidis included.Why compare to Acropolis 2021, anyway? Now is 2023 season coming...

Well, we'll find out soon.

[Danny0405]

They didn’t do it with Bertelli in New Zealand this year, even if there were no more target for them.
And globally, as far as I remember, they never do so with a pure «*gentlemen driver*» client whereas they could have done it multiple times (I don’t account Bouffier in 2018 or Greensmith in 2019 as Bouffier had some references in MC and Greensmith won one time his class in RC2 and was viewed with some potential by the team).
I can quote Jocius (1st rally of the year) or Gross both in 2020 as the most recent examples with Bertelli.
As they clearly say, they target only Driver title and with no real 3rd driver coming later apparently, at first glance, I would see them not changing it.

However, one point may be changing their strategy and make them asking a bit of help to Serderidis: the new rule about the PET testing days; if I remember correctly, it will be 21 days for 3-car team and 14 for 2-car team but with a real freedom on how to use it. As teams are not making specific PET for Monte Carlo and as Serderidis won’t make a lot of European rounds, maybe they could register Serderidis as a manufacturer driver in Monte Carlo to gain one more testing day for Tanak later in the season? All the more than with only 2 «*big*» cars, M-Sport won’t have that much days to focus on their lead driver (even if we can assume Loubet will be largely sacrificed for Tanak). But I don’t know enough how the rule works (especially about how to define how many days you’ve between 14 and 21 if you’ve a part-time 3rd car) to say if this trick is valuable or not, it’s more of a question to people here knowing the rule more precisely.

At least, it’s much more consistent than Citroen 2019 strategy; they were saying with target all the titles but with only 2 cars which was almost impossible considering how close where the cars (with Citroen a bit behind the others) and the level of the lead drivers; here, M-Sport is in the same situation but they clearly say «*WDC title is the only target*» and they took a backed driver as 2nd driver (only thing is that they will have sometimes a 3rd driver as a pure client).

[Rallyper]

They didn’t do it with Bertelli in New Zealand this year, even if there were no more target for them.
And globally, as far as I remember, they never do so with a pure «*gentlemen driver*» client whereas they could have done it multiple times (I don’t account Bouffier in 2018 or Greensmith in 2019 as Bouffier had some references in MC and Greensmith won one time his class in RC2 and was viewed with some potential by the team).
I can quote Jocius (1st rally of the year) or Gross both in 2020 as the most recent examples with Bertelli.
As they clearly say, they target only Driver title and with no real 3rd driver coming later apparently, at first glance, I would see them not changing it.

However, one point may be changing their strategy and make them asking a bit of help to Serderidis: the new rule about the PET testing days; if I remember correctly, it will be 21 days for 3-car team and 14 for 2-car team but with a real freedom on how to use it. As teams are not making specific PET for Monte Carlo and as Serderidis won’t make a lot of European rounds, maybe they could register Serderidis as a manufacturer driver in Monte Carlo to gain one more testing day for Tanak later in the season? All the more than with only 2 «*big*» cars, M-Sport won’t have that much days to focus on their lead driver (even if we can assume Loubet will be largely sacrificed for Tanak). But I don’t know enough how the rule works (especially about how to define how many days you’ve between 14 and 21 if you’ve a part-time 3rd car) to say if this trick is valuable or not, it’s more of a question to people here knowing the rule more precisely.

At least, it’s much more consistent than Citroen 2019 strategy; they were saying with target all the titles but with only 2 cars which was almost impossible considering how close where the cars (with Citroen a bit behind the others) and the level of the lead drivers; here, M-Sport is in the same situation but they clearly say «*WDC title is the only target*» and they took a backed driver as 2nd driver (only thing is that they will have sometimes a 3rd driver as a pure client).

Sounds reasonable to me.

[AnttiL]

However, one point may be changing their strategy and make them asking a bit of help to Serderidis: the new rule about the PET testing days; if I remember correctly, it will be 21 days for 3-car team and 14 for 2-car team but with a real freedom on how to use it. As teams are not making specific PET for Monte Carlo and as Serderidis won’t make a lot of European rounds, maybe they could register Serderidis as a manufacturer driver in Monte Carlo to gain one more testing day for Tanak later in the season? All the more than with only 2 «*big*» cars, M-Sport won’t have that much days to focus on their lead driver (even if we can assume Loubet will be largely sacrificed for Tanak). But I don’t know enough how the rule works (especially about how to define how many days you’ve between 14 and 21 if you’ve a part-time 3rd car) to say if this trick is valuable or not, it’s more of a question to people here knowing the rule more precisely.

Sorry but this is irrelevant. If you are registered as a manufacturer, you get 21 testing days, simple as that. The 7*driver rule applies to teams like Hyundai 2C or TGR NG.

But I agree with your other points. M-Sport is not going for a manufacturer title, and that's why then enter just two cars in a rally minimum, or five cars if there's enough paying customers. They don't need to "share" cars to get complete seasons or think about starting order etc.

[Danny0405]

Sorry but this is irrelevant. If you are registered as a manufacturer, you get 21 testing days, simple as that. The 7*driver rule applies to teams like Hyundai 2C or TGR NG.

You probably know better than me but it’s not why I understood from this Dirtfish article (but I haven’t checked more than this)

https://dirtfish.com/rally/wrc/why-a...e-in-december/

In terms of event preparation, for 2022 the equation was simple: one day per driver per European round of the championship. For a three-car team this season, that meant 30 days.

For a three-car team in 2023, it’s a flat rate of 21 days. If you’re a two-car team, it’s 14 days.

And the teams can use those days wherever and with whoever they like.

If, for example, Toyota wanted to give its world champion Kalle Rovanperä the best possible prep for the mountains, they could slot the Finn into a 10-day test taking in the best and the worst of the weather and the most capricious of the conditions.

But that would leave them with only 11 days for Rovanperä, Elfyn Evans and the shared car of Sébastien Ogier and Takamoto Katsuta for the remaining 12 rounds.

[AnttiL]

Well, Dirtfish has misunderstood it. The rules speak clearly of manufacturers and teams separately and it's clear what they mean.

PARTICIPATION – MANUFACTURER
A Manufacturer:
5.2.1 Undertakes to take part in all the rallies of the Championship with a minimum of two (2) World Rally Cars complying with the 2023 Appendix J, Article 262.

5.3 PARTICIPATION – WRC TEAM
A WRC Team;
5.3.1 Undertakes to take part in a minimum of 7 nominated rallies including one outside Europe with up to two World Rally Cars of the homologation number 400/01 WRC or Ra1-22/XX.
5.3.2 Will be eligible to score points only when there is a team scoring points in the WRC Manufacturer Championship with the same car homologation.
5.3.5 Cannot nominate a driver who has been nominated to score points in the corresponding Manufacturer Team in the same season.

Here's what it says about testng.

68.4.2 In the case of a Manufacturer, a maximum of 21 days. In the case of a WRC Team, a maximum of 7 days plus an additional 1 day per entered driver for any second nominated driver, up to a maximum of 7 days per driver and a maximum of 14 days per team. This clause does not apply to testing as stated in Art. 68.1.1.

[Danny0405]

Thank you for the information.
Interesting that it is 21 days for all manufacturers whatever the number of cars; with only 2 cars, it means M-Sport would have quite an advantage to give test days for Tanak against the other leaders (Rovanpera, Neuville); even if we can imagine Toyota and Hyundai will sacrifice a bit the 3rd driver

Other question: how does it work for privateer entered by a manufacturer but not registered as a manufacturer driver? (It was the case for Bertelli and Serderidis this year if I remind well). Because if their PET days don’t account in the 21 days, clearly, it gives even less interest to put Serderidis as manufacturer driver.

[Fast Eddie WRC]

M-Sport is confident it can keep up with its factory World Rally Championship rivals Toyota and Hyundai in the development race to provide Ott Tanak an opportunity to challenge.

https://www.autosport.com/wrc/news/m...nak-/10414608/

[AnttiL]

Thank you for the information.
Interesting that it is 21 days for all manufacturers whatever the number of cars; with only 2 cars, it means M-Sport would have quite an advantage to give test days for Tanak against the other leaders (Rovanpera, Neuville); even if we can imagine Toyota and Hyundai will sacrifice a bit the 3rd driver

Other question: how does it work for privateer entered by a manufacturer but not registered as a manufacturer driver? (It was the case for Bertelli and Serderidis this year if I remind well). Because if their PET days don’t account in the 21 days, clearly, it gives even less interest to put Serderidis as manufacturer driver.

Well, a two-car team doesn't really fight for the manufacturers title. As for drivers title, a three-car team could also just give all their test days to the lead driver.

Serderidis and other privateers are most likely outside test day limits as long as they don't drive for manufacturer points. And we saw this in Acropolis 2021: Serderidis drove the third Fiesta WRC but not for manufacturer points. I assume the same would happen this year.