Marcus Gronholm will mark his return to
a WRC car next week with a test in a MINI John Cooper Works WRC, six
months after suffering injuries owing a horrific crash at the X Games
which put him out of competition.
The big Finn will test for the
Motorsport Italia team in Sweden with their regular driver Michal
Kosciuszko ahead of the Kosciuszko's Rally Sweden next weekend.
Gronholm is a five times winner of Rally Sweden, for both Peugeot
(with whom Sweden 2000 was his first win) and Ford.
Bruno di Pianto, Motorsport Italia
boss, praised Gronholm as a legend and was sure Kosciuszko would
learn from the double World Champion's experience and skill.
He said: “He'll also take our Mini
John Cooper Works WRC out for a spin and test her limits, which'll
allow us to compare his and Michal's data on the 6km test stage, then
work on speed-saving details like technical corner entry, mid-corner
speed and corner exit.
"We'll run for about 100km and
Marcus will help Michal with the particular style of driving needed
for Sweden based on how much a driver can use or lean on the snow
banks.”
Gronholm last competed in a WRC car on
the Rally Sweden 2010 in a Ford Focus WRC for the Stobart VK M-Sport
team. He retired from full time competition in 2007, narrowly missing
out on the World Driver's Championship to Sebastian Loeb.
No comments:
Post a Comment