It’s no secret that Korean manufacturer Hyundai will be competing in the 2014 WRC season. However, this won’t be the Korean firm’s first foray into the discipline as it had done with the Accent model previously. This time there is a much bigger push into the formula as it a full works effort. In doing so it takes on reigning champions Volkswagen, as well as the semi-works efforts of Ford and Citroen.
Hyundai WRC was announced in 2012 and within a year the company set up a fully fledged rally team as well as developed and built a WRC car, no small feat. Since the first cars rolled out of the race division’s German headquarters over 7 000 km of testing has been conducted in all conditions that will be faced over the course of the 13-round championship. You can see videos of the cars testing here.
Hyundai has also managed to gain a major sponsor in the form of Shell Ultra Helix as both technical partner and part financial backer of its racing endeavours. Hyundai Shell WRC Team, to give it its title, has quite an experienced line up of race and development drivers.
The driving strength consists of Australian Chris Atkinson, Spaniard Dani Sordo, Finn Juho Hanninen and 2013 runner-up, Belgian Thierry Neuville. Drivers were chosen for their ability to excel on certain types of rallies, as such not all of them will compete at all rounds. In all likelihood the attack will be spearheaded by Sordo and Neuville with Atkinson and Hanninen alternating at various events.
At a recent teleconference hosted by Hyundai South Africa, we had the opportunity to chat with Hanninen and team boss Alain Penasse, who were both in Monte Carlo ahead of this weekend’s season-opener.
Hanninen, who has been part of the development programme since inception, stated that he is very happy to be a part of Hyundai’s re-entry into WRC. “There is a lot of experience and expertise in this team. Even Michelle Nandan (the team principal) feels like another engineer because he has done so much. He knows what is going on with the car and out on the road all the time. You can feel the motivation but how hard everybody works all the time.
When asked about the teams expectations he was very cautious: “We need to be realistic. We built a car in half a year. If we win with this car then the other teams should be doing something else. In the first year if we make (it onto) the podium we’ll be very happy. In 2015 we want to challenge for wins. 2014 is about experience building. In 2015 there is no reason we can’t win with this car.”
Penasse echoed the same sentiment: “This year is a learning curve for us. We are aiming to get all the cars to the finish at every race, especially at Monte Carlo. If we get any podiums in the second half of the year we will be very happy.”
Hyundai chose WRC as the vehicles in this class most closely resemble their road going counterparts, and for the easily accessible nature of the young and dynamic sport. With a dedicated teams of specialists and a driver line-up suited to almost every type of rally in the season, it won’t be long before we’re writing about a Hyundai win.
