M-Sport is already planning ways to make its all-new Ford Fiesta RS WRC even quicker following what the team felt saw as a dream debut on last week’s Rally of Portugal.Only one of the new Fiesta RS WRCs failed to finish the fifth round of the World Rally Championship (Lorenzo Bertelli crashed his private car on SS10) and team principal Malcolm Wilson said Ott Tanak’s Portuguese pace offered just a hint of what’s to come.
Tanak finished the event in fifth place, having run in an early podium spot and set times at the sharp end of the field throughout the rally.
M-Sport had always been planning to tweak the suspension on the car – apart from the shell, one of the few parts which remained unchanged from the 2014 Fiesta – but there’s likely to be some changes to the transmission which will improve stability under braking and offer more traction.
Tanak’s team-mate Elfyn Evans endured a testing time in Portugal, retiring from a fly-by-wire throttle problem on Friday and damage to the steering on Saturday. The Welshman was unable to explore the car’s potential through Sunday, running at the front of the field and keen to see the end of a leg.
“I’m delighted with what we’ve done here,” said Wilson. “OK, Elfyn’s had a tough event and, ironically, the part on the throttle which broke was carried over from the old car – and we never had one of them break in the all the years we’d been using them!
“But, look at the pace Ott has showed. He lost some time on Saturday morning with maybe the wrong tyres, but otherwise he’s been right there and right on the pace. We wouldn’t have seen that sort of pace from him in the old car – and don’t forget he was a man driving under pressure here. The new car is exactly what we hoped it would be.”
From: Maxrally