Skip to main content

Latvala Still Looking to Turn WRC Season Around

As we draw closer to the Rally Finland, which starts today, it’s a good time to look back on what has happened and forward to what is coming, since the Finnish rally marks the beginning of the second half of the 14 race season.

Before the 2016 season started, the smart money would have been on Jari-Matti Latvala as a safe second-placer, maybe even a championship leader. From the very first rally in Monaco, however, things have gone poorly for the Finn.

886x498_vw-20160306-6281

Jari-Matti Latvala is the lowest ranked Volkswagen Motorsport driver this year, even though he’s done well enough to be fourth overall.

“It obviously doesn’t look very rosy, but there is no reason to bury my head in the sand and give up,” Latvala says in an interview released by Volkswagen Motorsport.

The good news, though, is that this is exactly where Latvala was at this point in the season last year. With one win, a second and a fifth, the Finn had nearly exactly the same record last year, and was in fourth place overall then, too. By the end of that season, Latvala was in second place.

“My pace is there,” says Latvala, and the Finn’s home rally, the last three of which he won, is coming up next. Further, Latvala seems to do better in the second half of the season as a whole.

“We still have a few rallies ahead of us, at which I tend to do well,” says Latvala. Despite that, he is honest about his chances in for the season. “If we no longer have a realistic chance of winning the title, second place would be good.”

The post Latvala Still Looking to Turn WRC Season Around appeared first on VWVortex.



from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2agCJTB
via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Saying Goodbye to the CC V6

For all its size and its global reach, Volkswagen is still, in many ways, a deeply human company. There was, for instance, the Bugatti Veyron an ego project if ever there was one. Then the purchase of Ducati, a move most called folly. And then there was the Phaeton, the Volkswagen that most folks can’t afford. Not only were these moves all strange, I’m sure that they made VW’s accountants furious. None of them made good business sense, but they were all deeply interesting and they all are evidence of the heart that beats at the center of VW. Among these follies is the CC, a car that everyone agrees is rakishly handsome, but that no one really wanted to buy. The car couldn’t last, but the world is brighter for its having been in it. With the approach debut of the Arteon, it seems like a good time to look back on its sadly departing predecessor. The version I drove, because I live in Canada, is a V6 Wolfsburg Edition, which apparently isn’t available in the States. Nor is the V6, not as
Post a Comment
Read more

Waterfest Moves to Atco Dragway

Waterfest 24 will be held at Atco Dragway, in Atco, New Jersey. The summer event will take place at its new venue on July 21 and 22. Long held in Englishtown, New Jersey, the festival has been such a large part of the VW scene that the latest iteration of the Golf even comes with optional “Englishtown” wheels . The new venue, however, is an NHRA drag track a scant 52 miles southwest of Englishtown. The ¼ mile drag track opened in 1960, which makes it the oldest drag strip in New Jersey. The announcement came today on a social media post that announced the new location. Waterfest is North America’s largest VW/Audi show. As many 20,000 people show up for the annual show, making the second largest show in the world—with Worthersee being number one. 2018 will be Waterfest’s 24 th year in existence. The post Waterfest Moves to Atco Dragway appeared first on VWVortex . from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2GQjkuc via IFTTT
Post a Comment
Read more

Mitsubishi admits it lied about MPG ratings for all vehicles in Japan

Filed under: Government/Legal , Green , Mitsubishi , Fuel Efficiency , Japan Mitsubishi says its shady fuel-economy test practices may have been used on all vehicles it sells and has sold in Japan. Continue reading Mitsubishi admits it lied about MPG ratings for all vehicles in Japan Mitsubishi admits it lied about MPG ratings for all vehicles in Japan originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 11 May 2016 12:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink  |  Email this  |  Comments from Autoblog Volkswagen http://ift.tt/21X3bHv
Post a Comment
Read more