by Russell Atkins
Despite having decided to hang up his helmet after almost two decades of World Rally Championship competition, Marcus Grönholm has insisted the future remains bright for his Ford team – but was less confident over the chances of his young compatriot and team-mate
Mikko Hirvonen taking over his mantle as a title challenger.
The 39-year-old – world champion in both 2000 and 2002 – was bidding to make it a hat-trick this year, and led for the vast majority of the campaign until an error on stage four of the penultimate round in Ireland saw his Ford Focus RS WRC '07 leave the road, and with it effectively torpedo his title charge.
“It was disappointing,” he admitted to
Crash.net Radio, reflecting on the incontrovertible low point of his year. “On a scale from one to ten it ranked as a ten. I was hoping to end my rallying career with a championship title. It looked good up until Ireland when Seb (Loeb) took the lead, and then on Wales Rally GB it was impossible to do anything about it because he made no mistakes.”
Grönholm ultimately wound up just four points adrift of glory after triumphing five times to Loeb's eight during the campaign. He fought a number of no-holds barred battles with his French rival along the way, and singled out his New Zealand victory as a particularly striking and happy memory.
“There were many highlights in terms of wins,” he stated, “but maybe I'd say New Zealand was the biggest one when we beat Seb by 0.3s. That was really good – without him it would have been much easier! He was a very good rival.
“Looking back over my career, though, I'm happy to have won two world championships and many rallies.”
He may now be looking back, but there are rumours swirling around that he is also looking forwards, with suggestions the WRC may not have entirely seen the back of Marcus Grönholm just yet.
