|
A total of
55 Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) entrants will
take the start of next weekend’s 50th Sanremo Rally,
round eight of the series, with 19 of them driving
Super2000 cars. As well as being the penultimate
European round of the IRC this year, the Sanremo Rally
also counts for the Italian Rally Championship – which
will see a strong contingent of cars from Abarth in
particular.
The Italian
carmakers have an unrivalled winning record on the
Sanremo Rally having taken over half of the victories,
nationally-built cars having entered the winners' circle
25 times from the 49 times the rally has been run.
Lancia, the most famous of rally brands, has an
astounding 19 wins, Fiat weigh in with 5 and Alfa Romeo
has 1. Now the baton of history making is handed onto
the reborn Abarth brand.
The Abarth
team will line up with no fewer than six factory cars
next week on the 50th edition of their home event, for
Giandomenico Basso, Renato Travaglia, Andrea Navarra,
Anton Alén, Alessio Pisi and Umberto Scandola. Abarth
will be looking for back-to-back IRC wins in Sanremo
this coming week as Basso raced to victory on the last
round of the series, the Rally Principe de Asturias
earlier this month. The Abarth line-up has expanded as
the Sanremo Rally also counts towards the Italian Rally
Championship (CIR) where Travaglia and Navarra are both
running full-series factory-supported programmes.
Also driving
a privateer Grande Punto Abarth S2000 in the Sanremo,
for the renowned Italian Grifone team, will be the 1994
FIA World Rally Champion Didier Auriol, co-driven as
always by Denis Giraudet. Auriol, a three time winner of
the Sanremo Rally (1990,1991 and 1994) has has come out
of retirement this year to take part in a selected IRC
program. The Frenchman has shown that he has lost none
of his fabled speed having set the timesheets alight the
handful of events he has contested. Making it 8 Grande
Punto Abarths on the rally will be the privately run TRT
entry of Nicola Caldani.
The event will be a prime opportunity for Abarth to make
up ground in the manufacturers’ championship, where they
currently trail Peugeot. However, the French team is
also strongly represented. IRC series leader Nicolas
Vouilloz will start the rally first on the road, which
can actually be an advantage on asphalt as it means that
he will run on cleaner roads during the first passage
through the stages at least.
As was the case on the Sanremo Rally last year,
Mitsubishi is sure to be a strong force on the event
thanks to Paolo Andreucci’s official Ralliart Italia
entry. Andreucci, running on Pirelli tyres, has proved
to be masterful in the tricky conditions of Sanremo and
he will once more be one to watch. Pirelli’s other lead
drivers on the event include Luca Cantamessa and former
Sanremo winner Alessandro Perico.
A fierce battle also announces itself in the two-wheel
drive category, where local driver Marco Cavigioli in
the Fiat Punto JTD aims to extend his five-point lead of
the IRC 2WD Cup. Amongst his biggest challengers will be
the Honda Civic Type R R3 of Alessandro Bettega. Several
strong crews in Fiat Punto S1600s are expected to aid
Fiat's quest for 2WD Cup manufacturers' points.
The Sanremo Rally gets underway with four special stages
on Thursday night (25 September), which includes the
longest stage of the entire IRC season. The rally
finishes on Saturday afternoon after 12 stages in total
and 258 competitive kilometres.
|
