The Hyundai World Rally Team heads into round seven of the 2014 World Rally Championship, the Rally Poland, focused on accumulating more experience since none of its three drivers have competed on the event before.
Though one of the oldest rallying events in the world, the Rally Poland has featured on the modern WRC calendar just once – in 2009 – before Thierry Neuville, Juho Hanninen and Hayden Paddon had full-time drives in the series.
Coupled with entirely new stages being held in neighbouring Lithuania too, the Korean manufacturer is expecting a tougher than usual challenge as they contend with what is expected to be fast, but soft stages in the i20 WRC.
“We were able to take a number of positive elements away from Sardinia, including our first 1-2 stage wins,” said team principal Michel Nandan. “I feel that we are stronger as a team as a result of the experience of that event, which was certainly not an easy rally. Poland will be another new event for us and in fact quite new territory for everyone.
“It hasn’t been on the calendar for many years and a lot of the stages are completely new –including those in Lithuania which is a completely new country for WRC to visit. On Rally Poland, the stages are fast with a sandy surface so we need to have good traction.
“We carried out some important work on suspension and differential settings in between Argentina and Sardinia, which will be important for this weekend. It will not be easy but that is why we are here: to learn. We have three cars again with the same driver line-up so we will be able to pick up from where we left off in Sardinia – and aim to get all cars to the finish of the rally.”
