Four DS3s a possibility in Sweden

Citroen’s Oliver Quesnel has said that he feels confident that the multiple title-winning firm will be able to run up to four of the firm’s all-new DS3 WRC. The Citroen Total WRT will field two cars, while Quesnel is confident that two drivers can be found for their Junior Team.

No names have been announced as of yet, but he has expressed an interest in having Petter Solberg in a Junior Team DS3 WRC.

“We will have two teams next year but I can’t tell you who will be in the second team because we need to secure the budget first,” Quesnel said.

Quesnel expressed an interest in acquiring Kimi Raikkonen’s services for a second year. Should ‘The Iceman’ go to Citroen for another year; Red Bull will probably provide sponsorship for the Finn. Dani Sordo, however, would have a bit of a harder task to get a seat in a DS3 WRC for next year. The Spaniard would have to find a full budget, with Santander possibly becoming a sponsor.

“That means for Dani Sordo we would have to find 100 per cent of the budget if he was to continue with Citroen and that is very complicated. It is the same for Kimi Raikkonen.” added the Citroen Team Principal.

Quesnel also added that the drivers who could provide a budget would also need to be fast enough to be able to score points as well. The practice of having a paying driver in a team but is not fast is popular in Formula 1, but does usually take away from any interest in the race.

“We have a lot of demand but we would prefer to have the drivers with the budget who are also very fast. We would be very pleased with Kimi and Petter and I think they would have the priority but in the end we will see.”

“Last year, at this time, we didn’t have any customer so I am not worried. We will just have to wait but I am sure we will have two cars in the second team, even though it is quite complicated [to organise a second works team]." he added.

Rumours that Petter Solberg’s privateer team, PSWRT, would get another DS3 WRC have been ruled out because Citroen Racing announced that the DS3 WRC would not be publicly available until 2012 at the earliest.

On the opposite end of the Channel, Malcolm Wilson’s M-Sport operation is confident that possibly ten Fiesta RS WRCs could be present at the 2011 season opener.

“We’re not there yet but it’s possible,” said Wilson.

Prodrive, MINI’s appointed constructor, have said that there will not be a works MINI Countryman WRC in Sweden, but the car will make its works debut with Kris Meeke in Italy during the summer. No second driver has been announced by the firm but multiple named have been linked to a drive in the WRC’s newest challenger, names such as Kimi Raikkonen, Mads Ostberg, P-G Andersson and Marcus Gronholm.

Gronholm completed the car’s first full gravel test in Portugal some weeks back, but has since stated that he is no longer interested in a WRC-comeback.