MOTORSPORT: Now for The Monte

No sooner is the Dakar over than it’s time for another big rally – the world’s oldest, albeit much shorter, but thoroughly demanding too because of its varied conditions.

The 86th Monte Carlo Rally begins on Thursday night and the recent weather in the French Alps adjoining the principality and where the vast majority of the event is run has been more wintry than usual with ice and snow assured at times for the World Rally Championship competitors.

The service park and effective rally headquarters is at Gap, hometown of the world rally champion of the past five years, Sebastien Ogier, who will begin this title defence in a brand new M-Sport Fiesta with greater support from Ford.

While Ogier’s regular teammate this year will be Welshman Elfyn Evans – with Bryan Bouffier, a French specialist on The Monte in a third Fiesta for the team at this first of 13 WRC rounds – the main challengers this year are likely to be in Hyundais and Toyotas.

Belgian Thierry Neuville won four rounds last year, twice as many as any other driver including Ogier, while Norwegian Andreas Mikkelsen begins his first full season with the Korean manufacturer and may emerge as the main threat to the five-time champion.

New Zealander Hayden Paddon and Spaniard Dani Sordo will share a third Hyundai this year, although both will compete in Portugal in May when Hyundai fields four of its i20 Coupes. This week though it’s Sordo’s turn.

Toyota goes into the second year of its return to the WRC with its first non-Finnish driver, Estonian Ott Tanak, having joined from M-Sport to partner Jari-Matti Latvala and youngster Esapekka Lappi in a Yaris prepared by multiple world champion Tommi Makinen.

Citroen will field only two of its C3s, driven by Kris Meeke from Northern Ireland and Craig Breen from Ireland, with a cloud over its commitment to the championship, especially with team boss Yves Matton departing to become rally director with the governing Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA).

All the cars are developments of the more aggressive machinery introduced last season, with Hyundai and Toyota looking to be more consistent this year as they seek to dethrone Ogier, M-Sport and Ford.

But Mikkelsen, winner of the 2016 Rally Australia at Coffs Harbour in Volkswagen’s swansong and impressive there again for Hyundai last November, said The Monte “is an incredibly difficult challenge to start a new year with all kinds of conditions, including night driving where black ice can catch anyone out”.

The first two night stages will be close to midnight, with 17 in all over four days amounting to 388.6 kilometres of competition – almost half of it on a different route to last year.

Tweaks to the Daytona prototypes
It’s Daytona’s time as the American motorsport year gets into gear, with the 24-Hour classic on a combination of the famed speedway and a road circuit at the Florida venue next weekend.

The Cadillac prototypes that dominated last year’s American sports car championship and the recent ‘Roar before the 24’ have been hit with a reduction in their air restrictors, although they will be allowed a slightly larger fuel tank and refuelling restrictor within their 5.5-litre V8s (down from 6.2 litres last year).

The 3.5-litre turbocharged V6 Honda Acura ARX-05s with which Team Penske makes its return to sports car racing have been given an extra 4.0-litre fuel capacity and a larger opening in their air restrictors.

The 2.0-litre turbocharged four-cylinder Mazda RT24 prototypes which have been reworked by Germany’s Joest Racing since the middle of last year will be 15 kilograms lighter than at the Roar and have been allowed a rev limit increase from 8300 to 8600rpm and a slightly larger air restrictor.

The 3.8-litre turbocharged V6 Nissan Onroak prototypes also get an increase in rpm to 7100, while the three makes other than Cadillac have been allowed taller Gurney aerodynamic flaps.

Will Davison gets 12-Hour call-up
Many of the drivers in the 24 Hours of Daytona will fly immediately afterwards to Australia for the Bathurst 12-Hour on February 2-4, while Will Davison has become the 11th full-time Supercars Championship driver in the field.

Davison, a two-time winner of the Bathurst 1000 and on the podium at the 2014 12-Hour, has been added to the line-up in an Audi R8 to be run by renowned Belgian GT racing outfit WRT.

His co-drivers will be Portuguese ex-Formula 1 racer Pedro Lamy, Austrian Mathias Lauda (a son of Niki), and Canadian Paul Dalla Lana.

Davison’s brother Alex will be in a Competition Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3R at the 12-Hour with a line-up that includes Matt Campbell and American Patrick Long.

While the event will be WRT’s Bathurst debut, it has won races including the Spa 24-Hour and multiple titles in the Blancpain GT series.

The team has another entry will an all-international line-up among the eight R8s in the field for Mt Panorama.