"I’ve never been to Finland so it should be an interesting event," stated Clark, fresh from a tenth place finish in the JWRC class in Germany and third in the FSTi. "The aim is the rookie championship in the JWRC but we also have the competition of the other Fiesta STs and I expect Kalle Keskinen will be a good measure of pace there as it’s his home event. It looks like it’s going to be a lot of fun but we’ll just have to see what happens when we get there."
Red Bull Skoda:
[Harri Rovanpera, car #11 and Andreas Aigner, car #12]
Red Bull Skoda have opted
not to compete on this event, their next outing will be on the Cyprus Rally at the end of September.
Following their best points-haul of the season in Germany though, where Andreas Aigner finished sixth and DTM ace, Mattias Ekstrom 11th, team boss, Armin Schwarz, has pledged that they will be testing 'extensively' for that event, which will see Harri Rovanpera return to their line-up alongside Aigner.
"First off I want to congratulate the entire team including the co-drivers, but especially Andreas, who has driven a great rally and who really came up to my expectations," summed-up Schwarz, after the Rallye Deutschland on Sunday. "The thorough testing in conjunction with several technical improvements contributed a lot to this success. That's why in the coming weeks we will be testing extensively in Austria again with Harri Rovanpera and Andreas Aigner for our next rally in Cyprus."
Junior WRC:
In the Junior WRC, 17 of the 21 drivers contesting the series have opted to compete in Finland - those who will not take in the event are Luca Betti, Faith Kara, Bernd Casier and Aaron Burkart.
Patrik Sandell currently leads the Junior WRC championship with 26 points. Per-Gunnar Andersson is second, five behind, while
Urmo Aava is third on 20 – all three will be in action this coming weekend.
Kris Meeke fresh from his JWRC win in Germany last weekend has moved up to joint fifth with Caiser, 10 points off Sandell and one off
Conrad Rautenbach, who lies fourth.
