People coming with the excuses for Mikkelsen are all well and good, but remember for his sake/future events that Hyundai have Lappi and Sordo sitting in reserve instead.

Andreas isn't a kid. Only ogier has probably done more events in his career. As Est said above, nobody expecting stage winning pace or consistently in the same ballpark as top3/4, but hes miles off. Outpaced by a rookie msport pay driver. Suninen had decent enough pace in his first events in a rally1, but Hyundai signed mikkelsen to be their tarmac"expert" and ditched any idea of developing a younger driver.

And as far as Monte Carlo rallies go, this is about as kind conditions as you could ask for besides a few hellish corners. He simply will have to up his pace by a lot.