MOTORSPORT: Manufacturers lured to world rallying

The MINI John Cooper Works WRC will compete against stalwarts Citroen and Ford for the first time at Rally Italy on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia on May 5-8. The Prodrive-built MINI WRCs driven by Spain's Dani Sordo and Britain's Kris Meeke will contest five more rounds this year (though not Rally Australia on the Coffs Coast of NSW in September) before a full campaign next year.

Volkswagen is due to confirm its big-budget entry to world rallying on the eve of the event in Sardinia.

Though sister brand Skoda was initially earmarked to carry the Volkswagen Audi Group's flag in WRC, the Czech brand now looks set to stay in the second-level IRC series.

An announcement from Volkswagen about its WRC plans had been expected at Rally Portugal last month but was delayed because not all sign-offs had been obtained.

It is still not certain which model it will use. The Polo is favourite as this would also leverage the knowledge gained via Skoda's campaigning of its Fabia -- a twin under the skin to Polo.

Mirroring the MINI/BMW approach, VW is expected to start with a limited campaign in 2012 and then run the full season in 2013.

Its drivers are tipped to be hugely popular Norwegian former world champion Petter Solberg and Qatar's Nasser Al-Attiyah, winner of this year's Dakar marathon rally for VW. Al-Attiyah is already a world rally production car champion and currently competing in the Super 2000 WRC in a Ford Fiesta.

Apart from his driving credentials, Al-Attiyah's cause is helped by Qatar owning 21 per cent of VW.

SAAB -- now owned by Dutch sports car maker Spyker, which in turn is owned by  Russian tycoon Vladimir Antonov (who also has bought British-based WRC TV rights holder North One) has been signing engineers for a 2013 WRC campaign with its upcoming compact model, which will be called the 9-2 or the 9-1.

Russian Evgeny Novikov, formerly a member of the Citroen factory's junior team and now with Stobart-Ford, will be SAAB's lead driver.

The Swedish company won the Rally of Sweden four times with Swedish drivers--  Stig Blomqvist in 1973, '77 and '79 and Per Eklund in 1976.

Mini (without the capitals) has a longer and more glorious heritage in rallying. The "Three Musketeers" -- Irishman Paddy Hopkirk and Finns Timo Makinen and Rauno Aaltonen -- won the Monte Carlo Rally in the classic Mini Cooper S in 1964, '65 and '67.

The Cooper S first caused a sensation on the Monte in 1962 with Aaltonen leading just 3km from the finish before misjudging a corner and rolling out of the event. The next year Aaltonen took a class win and third outright, before a more powerful version of the Cooper S arrived.

In 1966 the Coopers mounted the finish ramp first, second and third but were disqualified on a technicality -- stewards decreed their headlight dipping mechanism did not conform to homologation requirements.

The Cooper S also achieved great success in circuit racing and became one of the definitive cars of its era.

The new WRC car is based on the MINI Countryman and has been developed in partnership between MINI, Prodrive and BMW Motorsport.

David Richards, the head of Prodrive (which ran Subaru's former WRC team and operates Ford Performance Vehicles and Ford Performance Racing in Australia) claims the MINI is a "radical" car that will be the "most stunning" in the WRC.

The MINI WRC is powered by a 1.6-litre turbo engine with direct injection while a 2.0-litre normally-aspirated version already has run a couple of times, with other drivers, in the WRC's Super 2000 category.

Richards has predicted that in time, with customer entries, there will be up to 10 MINIs running in world rallying. About a third of Prodrive's team of 500 people in Britain has been involved in developing the MINI, while the test team has comprised 15 -- seven engineers and eight technicians.

Richards said the limited campaign this year (WRC rounds in Finland, Germany, France, Spain and Britain) was about gaining experience ahead of "adding some more chapters to the [MINI] success story".

Spanish driver Sordo has already done five years in the WRC and was previously the teammate to Citroen's seven-time French world champion, Sebastien Loeb. A former Spanish and Junior WRC champion, Sordo has 29 WRC podiums on his CV.

Brit Meeke is a protégé of the late Scottish world champion and Subaru superstar, Colin McRae. A mechanical engineer and automotive designer, Meeke also competed in the Junior WRC before great success in the Intercontinental Rally Challenge, which he won in 2009.

Meanwhile, VW's announcement in Sardinia is expected to include confirmation that it will continue competing in the Dakar (which it has won three years straight with its Race Touareg).

Former Peugeot and Subaru engineer Francois-Xavier Demaison is tipped to lead the VW WRC effort.

While existing WRC participants Citroen and Ford have production 1.6-litre turbo engines, VW's closest engines are the 1.4-litre supercharged and turbocharged motors and the 2-litre turbo in the Golf GTI and Scirocco R.

A Scirocco R ran as the course car at last year's Rally Germany, driven by Spaniard Carlos Sainz -- a former world rally champion who has since become the star of VW's Dakar program.

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