Lack of experience may hurt Neuville

Belgian star Thierry Neuville is afraid his lack of gravel experience may stop him from fighting for victory on this weekend's RACMSA Rally of Scotland, round 10 of the 2011 IRC season.

“My experience on gravel is quite little, I didn’t do so many times with four-wheel-drive on gravel. In fact, Scotland will only be the third loose-surface rally of my career in a four-wheel drive car.”

Neuville, joint-second in the IRC Driver's standings, has only ever competed twice before in a 4WD car on gravel, in Sardinia and Scotland last year. He took fourth in Sardinia but crashed out of Scotland.

Indeed, Neuville has a better history on tarmac, having won in Corsica & San Remo this year, with San Remo, he says, being the last rally he was sure he could take the fight to the Skoda's for the win.

“I don’t know for the moment but San Remo was the last rally where I knew we could really fight for the victory. We have moved on from San Remo and I can’t really see myself challenging for the lead. I will focus on being as consistent as possible in order to come away with a strong result.” he added.

Neuville took part in a two-day test in the north of England, close to the Scottish border. He will get another test some time this week before the rally begins on Friday.