74 entrants for the 48 RallyRACC

(16/10/2012)

Though yet to be approved by the FIA, the RACC has closed the official entry list of the 48 RallyRACC Catalunya-COSTA DAURADA, Rally de España 2012, last scoring round of the FIA World Rally Championship and last event for the seven series included in the championship. The number of entrants recorded this year by RACC is significantly higher than the figures of the races that have been staged so far. A total of 74 cars, 12 more than in 2011 and 21 more than in 2010, make-up the ample and high-quality entry list. 17 of the 74 entrants are WRCars, 12 Super 2000 (7 of them SWRC) and 23 Production cars (14 PWRC). The remaining 22 starters are 2WD vehicles including the 8 participants of the WRC Academy.

This is the first season in which the RallyRACC will be a scoring round for all series, although 3 of the titles have already been awarded, namely those for WRC Drivers, Co-drivers and Manufacturers, which went to Sébastien Loeb, Daniel Elena and Citroën Total. The French team will obviously lead the list of 17 WRCars, which include all the teams registered for the Championship: Citroën Total (Sébastien Loeb, Mikko Hirvonen/Citroën DS3), Ford (Jari-Matti Latvala, Petter Solberg/Ford Fiesta RS), M-Sport Ford (Ott Tänak, John Powell/Ford Fiesta RS), Qatar (Hans Weijs/Citroën DS3), Citroën Junior (Thierry Neuville/Citroën DS3), Brazil (Daniel Oliveira/Ford Fiesta RS) and Adapta (Mads Østberg/Ford Fiesta RS). They will be joined by Mini Portugal (Chris Atkinson, Paulo Nobre/Mini John Cooper Works), Prodrive (Dani Sordo, Jarkko Nikara/Mini John Cooper Works), Czech Ford (Martin Prokop/Ford Fiesta RS), Seashore Qatar (Abdulaziz Alkuwari/Mini John Cooper Works) and Evgeny Novikov (Ford Fiesta RS).

This considerable number of entrants includes an unquestionable human and technical quality, given the presence of all drivers who follow the championship both in the overall class, as well as in the Production and Super 2000 series, in addition to the participants of the WRC Academy and Rally Class. Both overall World Champions (Sébastien Loeb and Petter Solberg), will be joined by other five who have achieved championship titles in the support series (in addition to Loeb, Daniel Sordo, Sébastien Ogier, Per-Gunnar Andersson, Martin Prokop and Hayden Paddon) as well as the reigning IRC champion Andreas Mikkelsen, and the 2007 IRC champion, Enrique García-Ojeda.

30 countries and 10 makes represented
Of the 148 drivers and co-drivers officially entered, representing a total of 30 countries, 32 are from Spain, 12 from France, 10 from Great Britain, 8 from Poland, 7 from Sweden and Italy, 6 from Norway, but there are also participants coming from countries so far away from Europe as New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, Peru, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, among many others, including participants from the Middle East, such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia. As regards the makes, there are 10 being represented either by official or private teams, lead by Ford (28 vehicles), followed by Mitsubishi (14), Subaru (9), Citroën (8) and Mini (5).

The Spanish drivers will be led by those who have raced some rounds of the World Championship: Dani Sordo-Carlos del Barrio (Mini WRC), Borja Rozada (co-driver to Benito Guerra in the PWRC), Alex Haro (co-driver to Ricardo Triviño in the PWRC) and José Antonio Suárez-Cándido Carrera (WRC Academy). They will be joined by Albert Llovera-Diego Vallejo (Abarth) in the SWRC and Yeray Lemes-Rogelio Peñate (Mitsubishi) and Josep Maria Membrado-Josep Ramon Ribolleda (Mitsubishi) in the PWRC. Other well-known Spanish participants are Enrique García-Ojeda (Citroën DS3 R3T) and Carles Llinàs, Rubén Gracia and Sergio Cruz, the three of them with a Group N Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X.

Last round for the Support Championships
The 7 drivers registered for the SWRC (Super 2000 vehicles) will be taking part in the Spanish round, joined by 5 participants who have not raced the whole championship. The highlight shall be the fight for the title between the three top drivers: Craig Breen from Ireland (Ford), Per-Gunnar Andersson from Sweden (Proton) and Yazeed Al Rajhi from Saudi Arabia (Ford). At the race but not scoring for the championship will be, as in all rounds, the Volkswagen Motorsport official team with Frenchman Sébastien Ogier and Andreas Mikkelsen from Norway, at the wheel of the Skoda Fabia S2000, as the last big test before launching the Polo R WRC in Monte Carlo. In this class as well, in addition to the 2011 Production Car World Champion Hayden Paddon from New Zealand (Skoda), Albert Llovera (Abarth), a driver who has turned his disability into a value, will be back again to race next to the great figures of motor sport.

In the PWRC (Production vehicles) there will be 14 registered and 9 non-scoring participants. With the Italian round still to be raced, which will be held one week before the Spanish rally, the fight for the title is more than intense with Benito Guerra (Mitsubishi) leading the standings, followed by three drivers who, together with the Mexican, have been taking turns in winning the rallies during the season:  Michal Kosciuszko (Mitsubishi) from Poland, Valeriy Gorban (Mitsubishi) from Ucraine and Marcos Ligato (Subaru) from Argentina. Representing Spain in the PWRC class there will be the two guest drivers Yeray Lemes and Josep Maria Membrado, both with a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X.

The WRC Academy, the series organised by the FIA and Ford for drivers under 25 years of age has already a title winner, namely Elfyn Evans from Wales, but there are five drivers who are mathematically able to clinch the runner-up title, although the main candidates are Brendan Reeves from Australia and José Antonio Suárez from Spain. 8 Ford Fiesta R2 will be taking part in this class, and they will be joined by 6 vehicles entered by the teams RMC (5) and PCR (1) with Spanish drivers at their wheels.

Rally Class is the name of the single-make championship organised by Symtech with Group N Subaru Impreza vehicles. The Spanish round will witness the outcome of the fight for the title between three drivers: Yuriy Protasov from Ucraine, Rifat Sungkar from Indonesia and Ricardo Triviño from Mexico. The winner will be awarded with a world championship programme for 2012.