Photo Credit: M-Sport There was something very familiar about the result of the 2018 Monte Carlo Rally. Yet remarkably, it was the first time in eight months and eight rallies that this particular dominant Frenchman had won a round of the World Rally Championship.
This particular dominant Frenchman is of course Sebastien Ogier. The world champion's Monte performance reminded his rivals why he is still the benchmark in the WRC, when a win for anybody else could have posed serious question over his reign. The first four of Ogier's five world crown's were built on an unerring balance of outright speed and tactical awareness - knowing when and where to bag the all important championship points. Switching from Volkswagen to M-Sport also saw a change in Ogier's tactics in 2017. Gone was his ability to obliterate the opposition with outright speed - he in fact won less stages all year than both his team-mates. The Frenchman's brain therefore came to the fore as he kept racking up vital points which, when Neuville floundered, brought him a fifth straight world championship. It was a devastating blend of these approaches that were in evidence on the opening round of the 2018 season. Ogier was quickest out of the blocks on Thursday's night's icy opener, and he would never be toppled as he cruised to WRC win number 41 and an early championship lead. Stealing the march over the rest would become a theme of Ogier's Monte. His M-Sport Fiesta was quicker than second place Ott Tanak's Yaris by quite some margin on both Saturday and Sunday morning, meaning that despite the Estonian's impressive pace on his Toyota debut, his former team-mate got the better of him by 58.3 seconds. The opening tests on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday were all unpredictable, treacherous, and in keeping with the traditional idea of a classic Rallye Monte-Carlo. Ogier mastered them better than anyone else to build up a comfortable lead that wouldn't deteriorate, even when he got stuck in a ditch and required the willing assistance of his home crowd. Ogier's understanding of the varying conditions was impeccable. Nobody else got the balance right between pushing and being conservative, which leads few in doubt that Ogier is the most capable driver in the WRC. But is he the outright fastest? It's a question that will slowly begin to be answered as the season progresses, but there's no doubting his dominance isn't where it was at when he was piloting a Polo R. This isn't to say that Ogier has lost any of his pace, it's more that the gap between himself and the rest has been bridged, with Thierry Neuville and Ott Tanak snapping at his heels and eager to take his world crown away from him. Neuville's Monte ended before it even began after sliding wide in the ice and losing four minutes trying to free his i20 Coupe WRC. But the Belgian's recovery mission was impressive, climbing back up to fifth place in the final stage after his SS1 excursion and a puncture on Friday morning. The Hyundai was fastest on six of the 17 special stages to Tanak and Ogier's four a piece, and that's despite Neuville largely having nobody to battle all weekend. Neuville was fastest on nearly twice as many stages as anybody else last season, and looks set to continue that trend in 2018. And with the conditions steady, Tanak was out pacing Ogier despite his inexperience in Toyota Gazoo Racing colours, Should Ogier be worried? It would be hard not to be, but it's worth remembering that immediately after the early stages on the Monte Ogier's mission was lead preservation. He may well have found some extra speed after having now had a full season and a full winter to test and develop the Fiesta WRC, he just didn't need to extract it from himself. Proving his speed while acting as a snow plough for his rivals will be tough in Sweden however, but it's a hindrance the Frenchman will be happy to accept if it means he holds the championship lead. Had his rivals beaten him in his own backyard, the pressure would be mounting. He would have had to have waited longer to get that confidence boosting first win of the season, and would be in the unfamiliar position of chasing rather than being chased. The last time Ogier didn't leave the opening round at the top of the tree of those doing a full season was 2011. This would have forced him into a more aggressive approach, which doesn't always yield results. Just ask Neuville. The pressure to get a rally win would be mounting while his rivals would be soaring, having got the better of the world champion from the off. Ogier is at his most comfortable when he is in control, up on his pedestal with a giant target on his back. After all, he's had five years practice at it.
0 Comments
Tanak has left M-Sport as he bids to become World Rally Champion Rally Estonia is one of the fastest European rallies in the world. Fitting then, that one of the quickest and most exciting drivers in the World Rally Championship should come from that very land. Ott Tanak has proven himself to be the real deal. After a third successive call-up to Malcolm Wilson’s M-Sport team, Tanak and co-driver Martin Jarveoja have moved on to pastures new, joining Tommi Makinen’s Toyota Gazoo Racing team. The question burning on everyone’s lips: was it the right move? Compatriot and mentor Markko Martin serves as the perfect example of how little moving teams can end up affecting things. Martin, like Tanak, received his big shot in the WRC with M-Sport and Ford. He took his first win in 2003 in the Focus RS WRC he would later describe as “the best rally car on earth,” and took a further couple of victories on his way to third place in the ’04 hampionship. Peugeot came calling and Martin signed on the dotted line to drive the 307 WRC in 2005. It’s hard to imagine two cars more paradoxical or two team environments more different. Martin had left the family-like environment of Ford where he was the established number one and joined the fiercely political Peugeot squad as Marcus Gronholm’s number two, in a car that struggled to impress in its debut year. It was a bold move. Any thoughts Martin would struggle would prove wide of the mark. He beat his team-mate on the Monte to fourth, grabbed second in Sweden and third in Mexico to lie just one point shy of Petter Solberg’s championship lead after three rounds. What happened afterwards was unforeseen and truly tragic with an accident on Wales Rally GB taking the life of his co-driver Michael Park, but his early season performances showed none of his speed or capability was lost when jumping into a new car. Martin swapped his Focus WRC for a 307, and proved just as quick Tanak played an instrumental role in developing the Fiesta RS WRC – a car which went on to win five rallies last year and feature on the podium after every single round. As team-mate Ogier struggled at times to get to grips with the machine, Tanak was flawless and was the quicker of the two across the entire season – taking 30 stage wins to Ogier’s 21. Tanak’s tally is only surpassed by Thierry Neuville’s stack of 56 scratch times. Tanak became a real dark horse in the title race. Getting that first win off his back in Sardinia was the shot of confidence he really needed, and from Rally Poland onwards he only lost five points to Ogier who went on to claim the title. This should worry Ogier. Equipped with the knowledge that points make prizes, Tanak’s game is now a dangerous blend of sensibility and blinding speed – speed which Ogier looks unable to match unless he’s unlocked substantial gains from himself and the Fiesta WRC in the off-season. Evidence therefore suggests that Tanak is ready to mount a serious title challenge. To do that, he needs to be in the best possible position. And recently it’s come to light that at M-Sport there was an imbalance within the team that was prohibiting Tanak’s progress. Due to the restricted budget M-Sport had compared with their rivals, Ogier was receiving upgrades to his Fiesta while Tanak wasn’t. The Estonian wasn’t ready to – and justifiably deserves not to be – a number two driver. After challenging seasons in 2012 and 2015 with the full factory team, last year’s campaign was the proof in the pudding Malcolm Wilson identified seven years ago after Tanak won the Pirelli Star Driver competition in a Mitsubishi Evo X. Tanak’s speed had never been in question though. A superb podium on Rally Poland in 2015 and a heart-breaking puncture on the final day of that same event one year on proved he had all the hallmarks of a rally winner. What had always been in doubt was his consistency. It’s not a coincidence that Wilson dropped him from his factory line-up on more than one occasion. Tanak was something of a loose canon when he first broke into the WRC When he first got his chance in the WRC, it was clear he was more of a Colin McRae than a Carlos Sainz. He’d won his first stage in just his second rally as a factory driver and bagged a podium at the end of the year, but retired on five separate occasions, equating at 38.5% of the rallies he started. In three seasons – 2012 and 2015 for M-Sport and 2016 for the DMACK World Rally Team – Tanak finished in the points 20 out of a possible 39 times, which works out at just over 50%. Compare that to Jari-Matti Latvala who himself isn’t exactly the yardstick for consistency in the WRC, and he’s 14% back, or to put it simpler, in the points five fewer times than his new team-mate. Tanak’s 2017 campaign was a much different story however. He was in the points 11 times in 2017 – a tally which includes six podiums and eight top five finishes – which compares with Latvala’s nine points scores, three podiums and six top fives. It’s unclear how much of that is down to the car; the Fiesta WRC was quick across all 13 rounds of the season whereas the Yaris WRC struggled in certain conditions. Inevitably with it being a new team, there were teething issues. The Yaris struggled more than its rivals in the engine-sapping altitude of Mexico, and reliability issues in both Poland and Finland put a serious dent in Latvala’s title challenge. Toyota were mightily impressive in their comeback year though. They were of course aided by the fact their rival teams had also all built new cars ahead of the season due to the change in the regulations, but to win on their second time out with the Yaris was both incredibly surprising and technically astonishing in equal measure. On certain rallies the car was simply untouchable. The Yaris won 18 of the 25 stages on Rally Finland compared to the six the Fiesta accomplished, but across the season the balance switches towards the Ford with 82 stage wins to the Toyota’s 50. It’s worth considering though that there were only two Yaris’ competing on the opening five events. Toyota's Yaris WRC was blindingly quick, but not everywhere The Yaris WRC has come on leaps and bounds in the last 12 months, and it’s certainly no secret that the budget and facilities available to Tommi Makinen’s squad is competitive to say the least. If M-Sport was the safe option then given his familiarity with the car and team, Toyota was the more ambitious option for Tanak. Sometimes to progress you need to go sideways, as Ogier proved spectacularly when he left the domineering Citroen team for Volkswagen. The environment Tanak is entering is heavily Finnish. Team principal Makinen and his right-hand man Kaj Lindstrom are both Finns, as are their four team-mates Latvala, Miikka Anttila, Esapekka Lappi and Janne Ferm. This is something that he’ll have to overcome quickly in order to succeed. It may seem trivial, but team spirit is a vital part in success - just look at Citroen’s current situation of disarray. Fortunately, Estonia is not far from Finland either geographically or culturally, and ultimately what counts is what Tanak does behind the wheel. Coming from the Fiesta he largely developed, he is stepping into a machine that has been moulded around Latvala. Adjusting to it hasn’t caused any significant headaches though, with Tanak already saying he feels comfortable in the car despite completing just four days of testing. Tanak’s switch brings more to his door than a different cockpit however. Making your first move away from a team that felt like home is difficult for any driver. Everything is different, so the pre-season preparation is that bit more extensive. One of the key things to nail early on however will be getting the better of his team-mates. He’s joining a team that Latvala is determined to make his own after his difficult patch at Volkswagen as understudy to Ogier. Tanak learned a lot from Ogier as his team-mate last year Worryingly for Latvala though, Tanak has already proven to be a match for the five-time world champion when paired alongside him.
The progress he has made as a driver over the past 12 months is staggering. He began last year’s Monte-Carlo as a solid number two to Ogier, and begins this year’s as a genuine contender for the World Rally Championship. Tanak is already a winner on both gravel and asphalt, and has shown a fine turn of speed on snow, taking four consecutive stage wins on last year’s Rally Sweden. But perhaps most importantly, he has seen first-hand how to win a world title. Ogier has always been known as an intelligent driver, but he really proved it in 2017. Without the dominant speed he enjoyed in a VW, the Frenchman was forced into a tactical approach last season; bagging the points where he could and building up a campaign. His consistency won him the title, and that measured approach is sure to have rubbed off on Tanak who shared a team with him. His results prove it. Tanak amassed 191 points last year which was good enough for third in the championship, but significantly is just 12 points less than he had achieved throughout his entire WRC career prior to the 2017 season. Tanak’s first test is now just a week away. Rallye Monte-Carlo has always been a lottery, with the weather and therefore tyre choice playing a huge factor in the result. Anything is possible, but sensibly Tanak isn’t aiming to win the opening round, even if he knows he’s capable. A steady start would suffice, and then he can build his speed up as his Toyota odometer begins to rise. Ott Tanak at the top of his game is now a frightening proposition, but he must implore the same determination to succeed as Markko Martin did 13 years ago. He must beat his team-mates from the outset to give himself the psychological edge. Lappi’s inexperience of the Monte must be exploited, while beating Latvala – particularly in Sweden – could bury the Finn who’s famous for struggling with the mental side of his game. It is perfectly feasible that Tanak could have won the World Rally Championship for M-Sport Ford, but the calculated risk and ambition showed by moving to Toyota could prove the springboard he needs to jump to the top and emerge from the shadows of Ogier. Photo Credit: @World 'Who do you fancy?' A truly terrifying call to hear from one of your mates as a growing boy. But an either tougher predicament when peering into your crystal ball ahead of the 2018 World Rally Championship season. The possibilities are endless. The 2017 WRC season was one of immense change. Sebastien Ogier swapped his pristine Volkswagen overalls for those of M-Sport, and the weapons leaving the service area were now lower, wider, more powerful and visually more aggressive. What resulted was genuinely one of the most unpredictable seasons in the sport's illustrious history, with seven different winners from all four teams. Was it Ogier's masterclass or Hyundai's capitulation? It's now just a chapter in the history of the sport, with a new page waiting to be written next week as Rallye Monte-Carlo gets underway. But who should we fancy - there's that question again. The obvious answer would be Sebastien Ogier. But then, depending on how you view 2017, the obvious answer would be Thierry Neuville. The Belgian really stepped up a gear last season. He and the Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC were the ultimate pace setters across the year, but had to settle for silver thanks to a costly combination of driver erorrs and mechanical failures. You can be certain that Neuville has learned his lessons from 2017 though, and let's not forget he heads into 2018 in the best form having won the season closing Rally Australia in November. With a more intelligent outlook Neuville could become impossible to match this year. However, the challenge will also be coming from within his own four walls. Andreas Mikkelsen was drafted in with three rounds to spare last season, but this year he will be a Hyundai driver for all 13 rounds of the championship, and could well be Neuville's biggest obstacle in becoming World Rally Champion, Mikkelsen endured a torrid start to 2017, after being left out in the cold in the wake of Volkswagen's sudden departure from the WRC. Odd appearances in a Skoda R5 followed before he got a crack at the new breed of world rally cars with Citroen. Sardinia and Poland didn't exactly go to plan, but a second in Germany was more like it and it was enough to see him join Hyundai to aid Neuville's championship bid. But there'll be no such helping hand this season. Mikkelsen has made his desire to win the championship no secret and having shown speed on all surfaces in the WRC, he can't be ruled out. It's going to be a big year for the Norwegian. Neuville and Mikkelsen will be supported by Dani Sordo and Hayden Paddon this season, with Mikkelsen's signature forcing Sordo and Paddon to share driving duties in the #6 i20. For Sordo this isn't such a big deal - the Spaniard can now fully concentrate on achieving the maximum results possible on the rounds he will enter as he bids to add more than one victory to his CV. For Paddon however, it's a huge slap in the face and almost an admission from Hyundai that they don't see the New Zealander as a superstar of the future. It's been a bizarre turnaround when you cast your mind back two years to when Paddon was making a real name for himself and Neuville was bereft of his famous self confidence. Make or break just about sums up 2018 for Paddon. The WRC was launched at the Autosport International Show in Birmingham last week M-Sport head into 2018 with a real swagger about them. The Cumbrian outfit marched to both world titles last season despite their privateer status and hold two aces up their sleeves ahead of the new season. Sebastien Ogier has remained for another shot at glory, and the extra backing from Ford Performance the entire service park had been craving has arrived; the team will now be known as the M-Sport Ford World Rally Team. On the downside, the team's fledgling star Ott Tanak has departed to Toyota, but the Estonian's exit may be a blessing in disguise as it's forced M-Sport to re-evaluate its approach. Ogier will be partnered by Elfyn Evans for all 13 rounds of the 2018 WRC, with the Welshman stepping up from the now defunct DMACK World Rally Team and filling the void left by Tanak. The third car however will be driven by a number of different drivers, in a move that sees speciality return to the championship for the first time in over a decade. Frenchman Bryan Bouffier will drive the car on Monte-Carlo and in Corsica, with Finn Teemu Suninen taking the wheel for Sweden, Mexcico, Portugal, Sardinia, Finland, Turkey, GB and Spain. No driver has currently been confirmed for Argentina, Germany or Australia. Suninen is a star of tomorrow and has already won stages in the WRC during sporadic appearances last year, while on the back of his maiden win on Wales Rally GB, Elfyn Evans has all the hallmarks of a championship dark horse. Bouffier is a previous winner of both the Monte and Corsica so his experience will be invaluable. But the one they're all looking to topple is Sebastien Ogier. The Frenchman's stock went up considerably last year and that's no mean feat given he started the season as a four-time world champion. He will be concerned about the lack of speed he showed throughout the year but it gave him a chance to show just how clever he is as a driver. The problem is all of his competitors saw that too, and with their searing speed clear in abundance, Ogier has a mammoth task ahead of him to make it six world titles. Hyundai, Toyota and Citroen are all looking to stop M-Sport Toyota's return to the WRC went better than even they could have expected. Two rounds in they were winners, and for much of the season Jari-Matti Latvala was in the hunt for the championship. Quite some turnaround for the man that looked a mere shadow of his former self during the latter years of his Volkswagen tenure. Toyota has given him a new leash of life; it's his team, and he's driving better than ever. You get the sense though that 2018 is the Finn's last real chance to earn that world title he so desperately craves. The competition within the camp has become a lot stronger though. Esapekka Lappi was immense in his debut year, taking a surprise home win in Finland, before somewhat fading towards the end of the year. Lappi has no experience of the opening rounds in a WRC car but is as cool as they come, and evidently frighteningly quick. Latvala's real challenge comes in the shape of Ott Tanak however. The Estonian's move to Toyota was the only major driver transfer from last year to this, and it was done with championship aspirations in mind. Tanak recently spoke of how he felt he would have been lodged as Ogier's number two at M-Sport, so jumped ship to the financial powerhouse and vastly improving Toyota outfit. Piloting the pick of the bunch last year in a Fiesta, Tanak's technical input is sure to drive the Yaris forward and his own individual performances proved he is the real deal. Tanak's mental game is also incredibly strong, which could go a long way against Latvala for inter-team supremacy. It'd be a headache for Tommi Makinen but a situation he's sure not to turn down if push came to shove. Citroen are a hard one to fathom Citroen Racing once ruled the roost. And really they should've done last season after pulling all their resources into developing the C3 WRC in 2016 instead of competing as a factory team. They even canned their immensely successful World Touring Car programme to develop their WRC challenger.
For whatever reason, the C3 was unpredictable at best, scary at worst. The handling took a long time to sort out, by which time lead driver Kris Meeke had been benched and Mikkelsen brought in, only for the Norwegian to wave goodbye to Paris the second Hyundai came calling. Say what you like about Citroen's past; 2017 was unacceptable. Aiming for the constructors championship, they came plum last and looked out of the race from round one. Aiming for Sebastien Ogier or no one in the driver market, they got no one. Meeke and Craig Breen remain with the squad for 2018, but there will be no permanent third driver. The disappointing Stephane Lefebvre has been dropped to WRC2 to demonstrate the capabilities of the C3 R5, with a third car appearing on occasion for Sheikh Khalid Al Qassimi. All of this will help Meeke though. With the manufacturers championship no longer the priority for the first time since we can remember, the Northern Irishman is free to chase his own championship dream. Breen will be out to get more podiums and experienced, but will only conduct a 10 round campaign as his car will be occupied in Mexcio, Corsica and Spain. That's because the PR dream has become a reality: Sebastien Loeb is back in the WRC. Let's not get distracted by the headlines; it's only for three rounds. And robbing Breen of those three rounds is frankly criminal. But, and it's a big but, Loeb has a genuine chance of succeeding on all three of the rallies he'll start. So Citroen may not be in championship contention and are facing a last minute change of leadership with Yves Matton departing, but they have a real chance of winning the most rallies across 2018. As for the world championship, I'm afraid I'm not bold enough to single out one individual. At least five drivers start the season with a real chance, and that number could well increase. The World Rally Championship is back to its very best, and it's only getting stronger. |
WRCArticles covering the World Rally Championship Archives
January 2018
Categories |