The Italian will compete with his usual number 46 and his Pirelli-shod car will be painted black: “Pirelli is enthusiastic about the opportunity of supplying its tyres in New Zealand for a third ace at the wheel of a
Subaru Impreza WRC.
Valentino Rossi sampled the quality of our P Zeros last year in Italy and the fact that he has once again opted for Pirelli is very satisfying,” said Pirelli rally manager, Mario Isola.
Route:
The rally shows major changes with the base moving 130km south from Auckland to Hamilton, close to North Island's west coast. There will be a single service park for the first time at the Mystery Creek Events Centre, a few kilometres south-east of the city.
The event will not journey north of Auckland and instead all the stages are based west of Hamilton, many hugging the Tasman Sea coastline. Some have not been used since the mid-1990s, with two tests on the second leg brand new and another unused since 1982.
The opening leg, south-west of Hamilton, is the longest and includes two passes over the 43.88km Te Koraha test, the longest of the season. The second leg is north-east of the city and both days end with a super special stage at Mystery Creek which surrounds the service park. The final leg is the only part of the rally common with 2005, and includes two passes over the classic Whaanga Coast test, regarded as one of the best in the entire championship. There are 17 stages in total, covering 358.48km in a route of 1354.26km.
Hot tip:
With
Sebastien Loeb still out injured, Marcus Gronholm,
Mikko Hirvonen and
Petter Solberg will be the three favourites. With Gronholm and Hirvonen keen to get to the finish and wrap up the manufacturers’ for Ford though, Solberg may be best placed to win,
especially as he will have an advantage on day one, with a better road position.
Last year:
Sebastien Loeb won the event in 2005, around 50 seconds up on Marcus Gronhohlm, who was second. Petter Solberg rounded out the podium, ahead of
Francois Duval and
Markko Martin. Two works’ drivers had problems and retired, namely Janne Tuohino (turbo) and Harri Rovanpera (tyres). Roman Kresta did not start after crashing out in the shakedown.
