PETTER SOLBERG WORLD RALLY TEAM Rally de Portugal 24 – 27 March 2011 From the dusty gravel roads in Mexico, we have travelled over the Atlantic and to the Algarve coast and Rally Portugal. We are ready for the third event in the 2011 WRC, Rally Portugal. Petter Solberg World Rally Team is already based in the service park just outside the Algarve Stadium in Faro. This year the event will kick off with a 3,27kms spectator stage in the historic part of Lisbon on Thursday afternoon. Shakedown will be…
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Rally – Sunday Service Park 1/30/2011
Welcome to the end of another weekend and another addition of the Sunday Service Park. We have a few items to discuss, but we also had the first round of the RallyCar/Rally America championship as well. The Landscape was different for Sno* Drift 2011 entirely. We had no Ken Block (WRC), no Travis Pastrana (NASCAR), and no Andrew Comrie Pricard. 2010 Rally America champion Antoine L’Estage was back alongside Nathalie Richard and Subaru Rally Team USA would now have David Higgins along side Dave Mirra. In the end, all of…
Read MoreRally – Petter Solberg tests Monte Carlo 207 S2000
Rally – Citroen Situation Update
The last 24 hours have been full of confusion and questions in regards to exactly what it is Citroen will be doing in the WRC. Heading into yesterday, we already knew that Loeb and Ogier would house the two factory rides. The former Citroen Junior squad was half full. Peter Van Merksteijn had been confirmed for 10 rounds of the championship which was due to start in Sweden for him. Enter Kimi Raikkonen and Petter Solberg. Both were rumored to land a Citroen ride as well but only four cars…
Read MoreRally – Not So Fast Kimi…
What is proving to be difficult is actually finding where Kimi Raikkonen will land for 2011. Earlier this week we had mentioned that a switch to Monster World Rally was all but certain after Finnish media indicated talk between Red Bull and Kimi had broken down. However, Autosport is now said that high level sources within Citroen say a deal should be done shortly keeping the 2007 F1 champ in a junior car. The report indicates that both parties involved are only talking 2011 and that the deal came about…
Read MoreSunday Service Park – 11/27/10
Welcome to the newest column at Openpaddock.net! As the rally season takes its short break they call an off season, the Sunday Service Park will be my time to give some opinion on the week’s news and address rumors within the WRC and Rally America blogs. This week has seen the driver market get kicked up a notch and Petter Solberg is trapped in the middle. Petter Solberg Last week during the podcast I had made the argument that Petter would be a reasonable fit at the Prodrive MINI operation.…
Read MoreRally – Solberg’s Future TBD in 2011
The last man to win the World Rally Championship that was not Sebastien Loeb is questioning his future in the sport for 2011. The 2003 champion has revealed that he does not have the budget to continue his privateer efforts when the new S2000T cars come on line next season. Solberg has been piloting a Citroen C4 the last couple seasons after offered a really good deal. This budget issue however may make Solberg a key player in the driver market if sponsorship cannot be found. Petter said he has…
Read MoreRally – Leg 1 in Spain
Sebastien Loeb has taken it easy this weekend and is still leading Rally Spain by 3.8secs over future teammate and Citroen Junior driver Sebastien Ogier. Loeb’s lead does come as a surprise as the first leg has a mixture of both tarmac and gravel. The Frenchman was first on the roads and sacrificed little time because of it. Jari-Matti Latvala is currently in third which is slightly below what the team were hoping. The idea was to have JML utilize his fast gravel pace to put a lead over the…
Read MoreRally – Loeb Storms to Win and 7th Title
Rally France has ended and was a bit all to predictable as Sebastien Loeb has taken Rally France and his seventh title in as many years. The rally itself was pretty cut and dry as nobody has been able to touch Loeb on the tarmac surface for sometime now. Even the rainy and muddy conditions could not slow down the Citroen ace from achieving what we all knew was eventually going to happen. Notable events from Day 2 that was not covered on the site include Kimi Raikkonen crashing as…
Read MoreRally – Loeb Wins Germany
Sebastian Loeb has won Rally Germany for the eighth time and has all but sured up the title with four events left. The Citroen ace was never in question of losing this event as he continues to destroy the competition on tarmac. The French ace now has 191 points to Sebastian Ogier’s 133. Ogier would finish on the final step of the podium while factory driver Dani Sordo would finish an impressive second. A result the Spaniard needed after coming back to the Total team after being demoted to the…
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