M-Sport World Rally Team’s Elfyn Evans and Ott Tänak made a promising start to the 2015 FIA World Rally Championship at Rallye Monte-Carlo this week. Despite suffering some misfortune on the penultimate day of competition, the team is encouraged by the speed, potential and never-give-up attitude of their young charges. Evans and co-driver Daniel Barritt finished the event in a solid seventh place but it could have been so much more.
The Welshman was in a strong fifth place – chasing fourth – when he clipped a wall through “Prunieres – Embrun 2” (SS11) and damaged the rear suspension of his Ford Fiesta RS WRC. Never willing to give up the fight, he and Barritt resourcefully fashioned a temporary repair which avoided retirement and kept them in the fight. Before the event Evans commented that he wanted to increase his speed on all 13 rounds of this year’s championship; and so far it is mission accomplished.
The Welshman may be lacking experience of this notoriously difficult event, but he overcame that – proving that he has the ability to challenge towards the head of the field with a third fastest time through “La Salle en Beaumont – Corps 1” (SS3) as well as a number of fastest split times...
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