Auckland New Zealand; The
WRC as of late has become all too predictable and more often than not the overall
winner is decided on the first day of the event. 2012 Brother Rally New Zealand
was no different; Citroens Sebastien Loeb would once again take control of the
rally on the first day, and basically never looked back.
Over the past few years many
in the sport have grumbled that 8 time WRC Champion Sebastien Loeb is now bad
for the sport, that he has become the Michael Schumacher of rally. Maybe there is merit
in this thinking, as rally fans tend to tune out on certain rallies once Loeb
takes control.
But should we outcast one
who is so perfect in his art, because no driver can match his pace, on any consistent
level that is?
Can Loeb be beat?, of course
he can, does Loeb make mistakes? Of course he does, he’s only human [I think] but
with the combination of Loeb, Daniel Elena and Citroen’s DS3 WRC it
just seems
like they are a full step ahead of any other team in the World Rally
Championship. Loeb won 7 out of the 22 stages on his way to victory on Rally
New Zealand.
In the case of Brother Rally New Zealand
2012, Loeb was aided to victory in no small part by poor tire selection in the
Ford camp, for the first four stages of the rally. It’s crazy to think that a
rally of 22 stages was decided so early. Yet Loeb the perfectionist felt his
performance was not perfect,
“It’s been a long weekend and my driving
has not been perfect,” admitted Loeb. “We made a few mistakes in the closing
Power Stage when we were pushing too hard but the most important thing is that
we have won. It was an exciting battle with Mikko [Hirvonen] yesterday but it’s
good to leave here with a victory.”
Loeb’s Citroen
teammate Mikko Hirvonen was the closest to knocking Loeb off his throne in New
Zealand. After putting in one hell of a
battle over the first two days Mikko admitted at the end of day two that he
could not match Loeb’s pace. Heading into day three word came down from the
Citroen mother ship to play nice, and hold positions, game over.
Mikko
Hirvonen would back off the push on Loeb on the final day and settle in to take
his Citroen home in second overall; Mikko claimed four stages wins along the
way.
Ford/MSport WRT came into
round # 7 of the 2012 WRC with high hopes of taking it to Loeb and Citroen. In
the days leading up to the start of the rally, Ford did not identified a driver to lead the charge, it was
more of a case of letting Petter Solberg and Jari-Matti Latvala chase
for the win, and decide who would push for victory should
the opportunity arise.
Any hope of a Ford WRT
driver grabbing the top step of the podium in New Zealand was quickly squashed on
Friday, starting with a wrong tire choice for/by Petter Solberg and then Latvala
going off the road on SS7.
Down but not out, Petter Solberg and co-driver Chris Patterson got
to work mid day Friday and began their push back to the podium. With the
Citroen boys, Loeb and Hirvonen well over a minute ahead after only four stages,
the only option for Petter was to narrow the gap of 29s to third, take it and
protect it. By the close of business on day one
Petter was within 8.3 second of the low spot on the podium.
Solberg would open big on day-two taking the stage win
on SS9 and in doing so he grabbed the final podium spot. Petter would see
little or no pressure for his position from the rest of the field, but readily
admitted that the bridge to second was just too far.
“I am very happy to have made it through the rally, especially after what happened on the first day,” said Solberg at the finish.
“I am very happy to have made it through the rally, especially after what happened on the first day,” said Solberg at the finish.
“We came here to win but a third place is still good so we must be
happy with that. The team and the car is fantastic, but we just need to keep
going and hopefully one day soon a win will follow.”
While
Solberg lost a massive amount of time on the first four stages of day-one, Fords
second driver Jari-Matti Latvala managed to stay within 16s of leader Hirvonen,
but an off on the afternoon stages ended any chances of Jari's hopes in New Zealand.
Determined
to save face, Latvala would put in one last big push for his Ford World Rally Team by taking victory on the final
stage of the rally, SS22, Burnside/Wech
Access, the power stage, therefore ending an otherwise disastrous outing at
Brother Rally New Zealand. The win on the power stage meant that Latvala would
bag 3 valuable points. Latvala would eventually finish 7th overall. With
continued mistakes by Latvala while under pressure; his position in the team
will also be under pressure, can Latvala wipe the slate clean with a victory at
home in Finland?.
Both
Ford and Citroen can come away more than satisfied with the performance of
their young guns, Ford’s Evgeny Novikov[RUS] held off Citroens Thierry Neuville [BEL] by a
mere 28s to finish 4th and 5th respectively.
For American Rally fans and his Hoonigan Nation, Ken Block and Alex Gelsomino put in a
very respectable drive in New Zealand, bringing the Monster World Rally Ford
Fiesta home in 9th overall.
"I'd like to do all of today’s stages
again,” said Block at the end of day two, “These are absolutely my favorite
roads in the world and this has been the most enjoyable day of my rallying
career despite one little spin. I hope conditions stay dry for tomorrow so we
can continue to enjoy these roads."
Block
added: "We have just been sliding from camber to camber and having a ball
out there today. I did some of these stages back in 2007 for Whangerai Rally in
a Group N car so I have some experience. They are just incredible to drive and
I’ve had a brilliant day.”
Block’s experience
on the WRC is really starting to show, Ken came out on top of a battle with Austrian rally legend Manfred Stohl who was
also driving a Ford Fiesta RS. With a very limited schedule in 2012, this
is Blocks second top ten finish on two
events, Ken finished 9th overall in Mexico in March.
Hayden
Patton took the top spot in SWRC on this
his home rally, Hayden and fellow Kiwi John Kennard placed their S2000 Skoda
Fabia 12th overall in the Rally.
Next
up for the WRC will be Nestle Oil Rally
Finland, a rally that was almost always dominated by the Flying
Finns until recent years. We expect to see a big push from Latvala, but with
his current form Loeb will again be the favorite.
Sebastien
Loeb and Ken Block will depart from New Zealand and head directly to the USA
where they will both compete at X Games Los Angles in RallyCross. This will be
a first for Loeb competing in RallyCross at this level; it will also be a
chance for Loeb to compete with his old rival Marcus Gronholm. Rally World News
will be on hand in Los Angles to give a firsthand account of all the action
from XGames RallyCross.
By Neil McDaid
Sources; WRC
By Neil McDaid
Sources; WRC
