Citroen do the double at Autosport Awards

Sebastian Loeb and the Citroen C4 WRC have won awards at this year’s edition of the Autosport Awards.

The Awards took place on Sunday 5^th December, with Loeb winning the International Rally Driver award for a fifth time this year, succeeding Mikko Hirvonen, who won the award last year.

Loeb almost lost the No.1 seed to Mikko Hirvonen last year, but a dominant display of driving and bad luck on the Finn’s side helped him to his sixth World title. He carried on his dominant display into this year, winning eight rallies, including two three-in-a-rows, to leave the rest of the drivers fighting for the runners-up spot.

1981 World Champion Ari Vatanen collected Loeb’s award, as the Frenchman could not attend the event. Vatanen later said: "His [Loeb’s] talent is phenomenal."

Citroen also did the double, with the all-conquering C4 WRC winning the ‘Rally Car of the Year’.

The C4 WRC was one of the short-listed cars, alongside the IRC-winning Skoda Fabia S2000 and the multiple Dakar-winning VW Race Toureag 3, but the C4’s 36 WRC wins, 87 podiums and 1261 WRC points eclipsed the others.

C4’s dominated this year’s championship, with no less than five C4’s present at any WRC rally, and at least one C4 present at the podium. C4 drivers Seb Loeb, Dani Sordo, Seb Ogier, Kimi Raikkonen and Petter Solberg scoring 1^st, 5^th, 4^th, 10^th and 3^rd, respectively, in the final points table.

The C4’s final WRC victory came on the 2000cc WRC Class car’s final WRC outing, on Wales Rally GB last month. Petter Solberg’s private C4 completed a C4 1-2.