FÉDÉRATION INTERNATIONALE DE L'AUTOMOBILE

2021 FIA WORLD RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP

ACROPOLIS RALLY GREECE

Pre-event Press Conference
9 September 2021

FIA WORLD RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP 

Present:
Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT – Elfyn Evans (GBR)
Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT – Dani Sordo (ESP)
M-Sport Ford WRT – Richard Millener (GBR)

Q:
A big talking point so far this week has been the weather, which is unusual. We’re seeing rain and muddy conditions out on the recce. How much were you surprised by that and how difficult was it to recce the stages in mud and fog?

EE:
Yeah a bit of a surprise to be honest to see it arrive. I don’t think anybody was expecting quite so much. But yeah, the recce was difficult to be honest. Obviously everybody is more or less writing new notes and when you have the fog then that makes things very, very difficult. And on top of that the mud also makes it very difficult to really get a feel and write accurate notes, so it’s not been easy out there.

Q:
You tested in dry conditions, in extreme heat. Is all that testing a bit worthless now? Has it completely changed for the weekend do you feel?

EE:
It was quite different in shakedown, let’s put it like that. I don’t think every stage on the rally will be so far away from what we tested but I’m sure there will be some stages on the same hand that are very, very different.

Q:
In terms of the potential for it to dry out, we’re supposed to get nice temperatures tomorrow and Saturday. It’s hard to know how much that’s going to change things, if it will dry everything out completely and what will be left there in the dried out mud?

EE:
Very difficult to predict what it’s going to look like in a couple of days’ time. Of course the thing that’s against the drying out on some of those Saturday stages is the altitude, high up in the mountains so perhaps not as warm as what we’re going to see down by the coast. But nonetheless anything can happen and we all know where there’s a lot of sun and a bit of high temperature it doesn’t take long for the mud to dry out.

Q:
Second in the championship, Seb’s still ahead now 38 points clear. Now Neuville has joined you in second position, how imperative is it that you get a win on the board? Are you feeling a bit of pressure now we’re nearing the end of the season?

EE:
Well, the situation is quite obviously needing a win, there’s no getting away from that if we want to claw back some of those points. But ultimately, we have to come to every rally and give our best so the situation does need a win, at the same time the approach still has to be to come to every event and give your all.

Q:
Last time you were here, the only time you were here, was in a very different car, very different circumstances in the R2 in WRC Academy. It went well for you then, is there anything you can take from that event to bring to this?

EE:
Probably very, very little to be honest. Normally I have an OK memory but to be honest it seems like quite a while ago now, almost 10 years already since I was here, so none of the stages really look familiar to be honest. And of course the pacenotes that we used back then are not really good for anything now.

Q:
Welcome back to the championship Dani. You have good experience and we’ve seen you on the podium before. Normally we’d say you’re in a great road position but I’m not so sure if you are in a great road position. With the Loutraki stages in that area, were they dry when you recced them?

DS:
Yeah honestly the first day of the rally it will be OK for us. The stages are still dry, but other ones are really, really muddy in the recce. I think they will dry a little bit for sure if it stops to rain but it will not be like proper dry. But it’s this. It’s not like a normal rally in Greece, we expected really high temperatures and sun everyday and all but yeah, we didn’t get this.

Q:
In terms of tyre choice, especially tomorrow, you have to make that selection today. That’s going to be a tough choice with just eight softs which could be the prime tyre, how difficult is that going to be Dani?

DS:
Yeah honestly I think for tomorrow it’s not really, really difficult to choose the tyres but for second and third day it will be a little bit more complicated.

Q:
In terms of what you can do this weekend, given your experience of this rally, do you think you have an advantage?

DS:
I don’t know, it was many years like I did this rally and honestly when you are in the stages I didn’t think about. I remember some parts but it was many years before. Also, the picture of the rally is completely different than before, what we see during the recce. First day there were some parts I remember a bit over the years but the second and third day it was completely like for me I was feeling like I was in Wales, with the fog, the mud places, it was completely different. But it was nice also.

Q:
What’s happening with next year? When are we going to hear a complete question on what you’re doing next year?

DS:
I don’t know. For sure I will do something, but we don’t know yet. Now I’m focusing to do this rally as they come now, they are very important for us also especially timing, but yeah after that we need to take a little bit of time to see what we can do.

Q:
Are we going to be surprised by your choice?

DS:
I don’t think so.

Q:
Let’s talk first and foremost about Teemu Suninen, that was the big news last week. He announced he was leaving M-Sport and moving onto other things, what we don’t quite know as yet. Was that a mutual decision between you both?

RM:
Yeah I think at the start of the year we made it clear that the idea wouldn’t be a full season in the WRC car, we know he had a difficult Monte-Carlo, difficult Sardinia and the results in Arctic and Estonia were not probably as we’d all hoped. We were using Teemu in the Rally2 car which is obviously a very important formula for M-Sport and we decided that for the remainder of the year we would like to see a more Rally2 based programme and gave an opportunity to still show the potential of Teemu going into our decision for next year. That wasn’t what he wanted to do and [he] made the decision he wanted to go elsewhere and try a different route. And I think anybody that knows Malcolm would know that he wouldn’t fully shut a door on a driver, a lot of drivers in the championship have had ups and downs in their careers and had to take sidesteps to get to where they are now, so I don’t think and I’m sure it’s not the end with Teemu but it’s maybe the end with Teemu for the time being. I’m sure he’ll do very well in Finland in the Rally2 car and we wish him all the best of luck and it’s been very enjoyable working with him, and he’s still a very talented driver. Yeah maybe this chapter is finished but I’m sure a new chapter will start for him.

Q:
With the possibility of Teemu, if he had stayed with you, elevating Fourmaux into all the WRC drivers. Is that with a mind to confirming him as a full-time driver next year in a WRC programme?

RM:
I think Adrien’s done very well this year in the rallies he’s competed in. With Teemu’s decision now it’s made it very easy for us to use Adrien for the remaining events in the WRC car. It’s been well documented he’s driven the 2022 car quite a bit so he is within our plans for next year and, like I say, Teemu deciding to go a different route has helped us in that respect but we still have a bit of time before 2022 anyway. So we still have some time to decide.

Q:
Time is ticking away though, and I have to say the most speculation right now is around the M-Sport team and the driver line-up. Craig Breen’s name has been mentioned, even Sebastien Loeb’s for months and months now. What is the situation?

RM:
I don’t think the situation changes from every time you ask me the question really. I enjoy looking at the various photoshop skills on the internet, some of them are good, some of them are terrible. I think yeah, it would be silly to think we’re not speaking to everybody that could possibly be an option but you know, the way that motorsport works these days a lot of things have to fall into place to get things to work. It’s not as simple as what people might comment on social media ‘just get this person to do this.’ It’s not like that. We have some time to make sure that we as a team can be in the right position to put these people we’re talking to into the car, and we already have ideas we want to go through with anyway. There’s a lot of new technology, new challenges for us as M-Sport as a team next year as well and a lot has to fall into place before we’re ready to announce. So people can speculate all they like but unfortunately it’ll be announced when we’re ready and at the moment that’s not right now.

Q:
What exactly are you looking for in terms of a driver line-up next year ?

RM:
We want the most competitive package we can put together. We’ve got a car that looks great and we’ve seen from the testing videos, we’ve been getting some very good testing in in the last couple of weeks and we want to, we know that 2022 is our best opportunity to go well. Malcolm’s always managed to make a car that’s very competitive when the rules have a big change so we know that we’ve got to capitalise on that, and we need the crews that can deliver as well. It’s fairly obvious what we want and what we want to do and we want to be competitive, we want to win, but we’re not quite ready to announce how we’re going to try and do that yet.

Q:
No-one likes to talk about money, Rich, but I’m going to. Is there budget to get the kind of driver you want to win rallies.

RM:
Pfft, there’s always options to get who you want and it’s not always necessarily about budget. I don’t like to really talk about it. At the end of the day people can comment on social media that we should have more, we should have this, we should have that. Well, we have what we have you know. Ultimately there’s no point complaining about the situation we’re in. We’re developing a car, we have a car coming, we’ll homologate and we’ll be here next year and it’s down to us to find the best package that we can work around that. It frustrates me a little bit when it’s always that question, should we get more ? It’s irrelevant because we’ve got what we’ve got and we need to make the best out of it, and we’ve shown in the past it’s possible to do it. It’s not easy but we’ll give it out best to make sure we can.

Q:
Talking about development of the car, how’s it going ? We’ve seen plenty of the Puma in action, it looks good, but what have been the challenges surrounding creating this brand new car for a brand new era ?

RM:
Yeah we had a really solid test, and it’s a great opportunity to thank all the boys and girls that were working on it because we sent them to France for four days and then straight to Sardinia for four days so it was a really challenging time for them, difficult time for them and long days but we’re learning a lot about the hybrid, how it works and you know, it’s a big difference. I’m sure Elfyn can agree after his initial testing it’s very different to what we’re used to at the moment, but the feedback we’re getting is very positive. I don’t get told much so that I can’t tell you lot much, so all I know is it’s different, it’s positive and the guys are looking forward to driving the car.

Questions from the floor:

Stathis Kokkorogiannis, Gazzetta.gr (GR)

Q:
Given your starting position and the weather conditions, do you feel you’ll have an advantage at least for the first part of the rally?

DS:
Yeah of course if it’s dry like it is normally on the first day, more back you start the better road position like always on gravel to be honest. But we have to watch some stones in some places because there’s really stones in the size they come to the middle. I think we have more advantage than disadvantage. For sure second day, if it’s like this it will not be any advantage but if it’s like this to survive the corners they will be nice because it’s very slippery. Like I say, if tomorrow is good weather they will dry a lot, not total dry I think but it will be a much nicer surface.

Q:
We’ve seen you leading the world championship but this year’s circumstances are different given the gap to Sebastien Ogier. Do you feel better as the hunter or would you rather be the hunted ?

EE:
Well I think if you’re the hunted then you’re in a stronger position so yeah. There’s pros and cons to both I guess but ultimately it doesn’t really change a lot because like I mentioned, you have to come to every rally and do what you can. The battle is tight whether you’re ahead or behind, either way you still have to fight as much as you can and give your best performance.

Reiner Kuhn, Motorsport Aktuell (GER)

Q:
What’s changed on the car to sort out the suspension issues on the previous gravel rounds?

DS:
Not a lot, adjust a little bit the suspension, the springs, clicks and all the ride height for this rally because normally the surface is more bumpy, more stones, you need to drive more higher. We didn’t change a lot, a lot because after recce it’s quite not so bad.

Frantzis Georgios, F1fan.gr (GR)

Q:
Do you feel retirements and difficulties due to the harsh surface of the stages may shake things up in the drivers’ standings ?

EE:
I’m not so sure to be honest this year. I think the roads have been repaired quite differently and really well compared to what I remember back in 2012. The stages are not looking so, so rough anymore to be honest so of course now we have this weather and the difficult conditions so I guess that’s going to pose more of a challenge now than perhaps the rough conditions we normally associate with this rally.

FIA WRC2 CHAMPIONSHIP

Present:
Toksport WRT – Andreas Mikkelsen (NOR)
TRT WRT – Mads Østberg (NOR)

Q:
Andreas you’re leading the championship as we head into this event, you have the benefit of the points in hand right now, how are you feeling about the championship at this point in time?

AM:
It’s not a lot of rallies left in the season, this is our second last one. It will be important to have a good finish here, I already scored my zero pointer in Sardinia so yeah, that means that I have to reach the finish and have to be a bit clever. But this rally is all about trying to be clever. It’s very rough, like we know Greece is. I don’t think it will be about pure flat out speed, you need to drive fast when we can drive fast and be a bit clever when you need to. I think we just need to use our experience as good as possible. Me and Mads are some of the top dogs, the old dogs, in WRC so I think we both have to use our experience for this event.

Q:
Dani’s done the event a few times, Elfyn’s only done it once but both of them were really struggling to remember things. But you’ve obviously got good memory of what you’ve experienced here at the Acropolis Rally before ?

AM:
Yeah I do. I think we were fourth and it’s as well where I had my first stage win, so yeah good memories. But what I remember, yeah, tomorrow’s stages, Friday’s stages, a little bit in the same area but the rest is completely new. So it was quite different actually the Saturday stages and the Sunday stages to what I was expecting. A lot in the forest and yeah, tight and twisty. So it will be interesting.

Q:
How different to what you were expecting is it in terms of weather as well ? Mud out there, fog on the recce, it was very Wales like which both of you have good experience of as well.

AM:
Yeah but I think the mud over here is something completely different, it’s like ice. And the mud and the gravel is changing all the time so on the recce itw as really, really difficult however I do expect the rally to be a bit better conditions, I hope anyway. We’ll see, we’ll find out.

Q:
You’ve got a brand new co-driver alongside you in Elliott Edmondson. It’s back to English pacenotes for you now.

AM:
Yeah I haven’t had English pacenotes in a long time, I think the last time was 2013/14 so this will be something new. We had two days in Sardinia last week doing Pirelli testing, two days on Tarmac with the WRC car and first run, very tricky road, and he read really perfect from the beginning. And on tests it’s been working fine for me in English, let’s see on the rally. I don’t know, we’ll have to find out.

Q:
It’s all about building up that trust again with someone new with you, regardless of the language. It is a new person.

AM:
Yeah it’s a new person, but he’s very professional, he has a lot of experience even though he’s quite young so I’m sure he’s up for the job. It’s more if I can get everything into my head as easy as Norwegian. This is the question mark during the weekend. Luckily it’s not a high speed rally, it’s quite twisty and I think it should be a bit easier for the co-driver than, or for me to get the information in.

Q:
Let’s turn to Mads Ostberg, the battle resumes between the pair of you. You have good experience of this rally as well but it is different, and it looks different out there with the weather we’ve had. It should dry out, but how challenging is it going to be given the conditions you’ve seen on the recce?

MO:
Well, I think it will be for sure a challenging weekend. I think we know the rally from the past but I would say this is a completely different rally than what I’ve seen before. Like Andreas said, I also remember Friday. It’s close to where we have been in the past with Loutraki and the stages around there but Saturday and Sunday is brand new, I haven’t seen it before as far as I know anyway. They look like different stages, I don’t feel like I’m in Greece I feel like I’m in Wales or Argentina or Chile or something completely different. But all of them are nice stages for sure, but very tricky during the recce with all the fog and the rain and the mud. We had more than enough just trying to get through the recce to be honest so it was challenging, but it looks to be a little bit better for the weekend.

Q:
We’re hearing we might get a little bit of rain on Sunday as well. It’s going to dry out quickly I’m sure, but in terms of the tyre choice you have ahead of you, how much of a difficulty is that going to be?

MO:
Yeah it will be challenging. I mean we have eight soft tyres and I think we could have done quite a lot of the rally with soft tyres this year. So it will be a compromise all the way through the event, like we have on every rally. Never really have all the choices so we have to mix  a lot and we will have to mix as well this weekend, try to use the soft tyres where we absolutely need to and where we can gain the most and then probably give away a little bit of time with the hard tyre. It will be from a strategy, a very important rally.

Q:
Andreas mentioned it, it’s not the quickest rally out there and it’s all about choosing where you push, where you hold back. How important is it for you to win here though, for the championship?

MO:
Well it’s always important to win, so we’re trying to do that on every event. We have had some challenging rallies behind us now with a lot of small things which was difficult to control and I think it will not be any easier to control the same type of problems on this event, so I think for us we just have to try and be clever and push where we can. And hopefully we can continue on the same pace as we have had previously this year and try to be comfortable and enjoy the stages.

Q:
Two rivals in FIA WRC2, both Norwegians, how is the rivalry between you? Are you guys talking at the moment?

MO:
No we are not talking! [laughs]. No we are for sure talking and I think it’s nice to see. Me and Andreas have had quite similar careers all the way through and even now we are both in WRC2 so we’re like following each other on all the steps we are doing. But it’s nice to fight with Andreas of course. I don’t like to be beaten by him, so it keeps me sharp no doubt.

Q:
And I’m sure the reverse is the same for you Andreas, you don’t like to be beaten by him either?

AM:
No, I think it’s like this. Two Norwegians, I want to be the best Norwegian, it’s the way it is. But like Mads says we have a lot of history, we’ve always been fighting since day one and now we’re fighting in WRC2. Seems like it will be between us in WRC2 this year as well so it will be interesting.

Questions from the floor:

Bo Christer Bofeldt, Worldrally.se (SWE)

Q:
Is Elliott going to be your co-driver for the rest of the season?

AM:
This is not sure. We will do this rally and Azores, and I’ve already tried several co-drivers this season and I plan to try several different, and then we see what we end up with. It’s quite tricky to change in the middle of the season of course, so let’s see. We do these two events and we have a sit down, see how these went and we will take the choice for the next rallies coming up.

Reiner Kuhn, Motorsport Aktuell (GER)

Q:
Where will we see you after this event. In Spain or another Tarmac rally?

AM:
Depends on this weekend a little bit, let’s see. But next rally I will do is Azores.

MO:
What’s the next event after this? [Finland]. I’ll be there.

Stathis Kokkorogiannis, Gazzetta.gr (GR)

Q:
Which stage are you looking forward to the most here?

AM:
Good question, maybe SS1! [laughs]. On these stages they are rough so it’s not like stages that you enjoy so much, you’re probably driving and you’re trying to stay away from trouble, it’s not an enjoyment as in other rallies where it’s all about flat out, being on the limiter. So I don’t know. Maybe tomorrow’s stages I like quite well. Saturday, I like all the stages but if it’s really, really muddy it will be very difficult so let’s see.

MO:
That’s a very good question. I think SS1 like Andreas say might be the easiest stage of the weekend, but for sure there are very nice stages on Friday. I look forward to coming back to those stages again and then I think it will be a new type of event when we start Saturday and Sunday. But the stages looked amazing, so hopefully a bit better conditions than during the recce and I’m sure we’ll enjoy the stages a lot.

FIA WRC3 CHAMPIONSHIP

Present:
Kajetan Kajetanowicz (POL)
Lambros Athanassoulas (GRC)

Q:
Lambros let’s start with you because this is your home event, finally we are seeing the Acropolis Rally back on the WRC calendar after eight long years away. How does it feel to have it back?

LA:
It feels great. I mean Acropolis Rally, for all the Greek guys here, all the drivers and all the fans is something really extraordinary. And having not been on the calendar for eight years, it was a big absence, so we are happy to have it back, even though the rally of god has brought a lot of rain. But let’s hope for a better two days coming and some of the stages to dry out a little bit.

Q:
You have the most experience of the weather conditions and how the stages will react. If we do have dry weather, how quickly will they dry out?

LA:
Some parts of some stages might dry out but I’m expecting a lot of surprises for all the drives, for me also. Even though I know these roads, you are never sure if the next corner is dry or not so we have to take extra caution, a lot of luck, and for sure we’re going to have many offs. I mean not big offs because we are just sliding on slow kilometres, but I’m expecting many offs into the ditches and let’s hope that we are not one of them.

Q:
What do you think of the route and the stage selection we’re seeing this year? For many of the drivers, these are stages that they haven’t done before apart from the Loutraki stages on Friday.

LA:
It’s a nice combination of stages because it has many different kind of roads. Loutraki stages are completely different than here. The Sunday stages are new and if they will dry they will be exceptional, the rhythm and the kind of corners we will be driving are really nice. And it’s great that we went through all these regions of Greece, so all the drivers that haven’t been here before can see the beauty of Greece.

Q:
You’re in WRC3 and you have some seriously strong rivals out there. What is the hope, what are you hoping to achieve?

LA:
You should ask my friend here [Kajetan Kajetanowicz]. We’ve been in this rally before as opponents so I will try to be top speed with these guys, and let’s hope I can make it.

Q:
You know how strong the guy alongside you is as well

LA:
Of course I know, he knows also that in these stages that we know really well we can be close to them. And if it was dry I would say that I would be more confident, but now since they have better experience than us, we will try for sure, and let’s hope we can be on the podium.

Q:
The fact you have knowledge of these stages over everyone else, is that going to be the big advantage this weekend?

LA:
Yes it depends. If it dries out for sure I have a bit advantage because they haven’t seen the stages dry, and doing the recce with so much mud, if it dries out I have a big advantage. But I’m not expecting it to dry out, we have Friday stages most probably the morning loop which are dry and then we have to have luck also with us, and let’s hope that nobody goes off the road and we all be here smiling at the end.

Q:
Kajto let’s turn to you now. Second in the championship in FIA WRC3. First of all let’s talk about your season so far because you’ve had two wins, it’s been a strong season. What have you thought of your performance?

KK:
To be honest I’m happy because we are second. We won two rallies as you said but I did a mistake in Sardinia, stupid mistake when we were leading I went off on a slow corner and it’s difficult to not remember! Now we are looking forward, we are in Greece, in a beautiful rally, beautiful rally and beautiful place. OK we didn’t expect the weather but the condition is same for everybody. We’ll see what we can do but first of all, I would like to say thank you to Lambros because he helped me a lot with the test. He’s a good man, not only a good driver. Thank you.

Q:
You have good experience here at the Acropolis Rally, how much of an advantage do you feel that can be for you?

KK:
Yes we did one Acropolis Rally with this condition, that was 2015. I don’t forget, but I have only good memories from this rally. I won two times but also in one year I did the big mistake. You can be focused in every second of the stages, on every stage it’s difficult to read the road. Especially in this condition because grip is changing all the time and it looks the same colour, the mud, but it’s a completely different surface, it’s much more slippery. That’s a problem when you need to brake or try to turn. But as I said, everybody is in the same situation, we’ll see. Of course we would like to win again but it’s going to be a tough challenge.

Questions from the floor:

Reiner Kuhn, Motorsport Aktuell (GER)

Q:
What are your plans after this event?

KK:
Holidays! No, it’s a joke. Japan is not possible. Next event I think Spain, for sure Spain. We have one event more than my main rival [Yohan] Rossel so we should be there in Spain and also Monza, but tell me [if it’s happening].

Stathis Kokkorogiannis, Gazzetta.gr (GR)

Q:
Do you feel any pressure for the event, and what does it mean for Greek motorsport to return to the Acropolis?

LA:
Starting with the first one, no I don’t feel any pressure at all I just want to have fun. Nikoloas my co-driver, we were on the start of the shakedown, he watched me and say ‘why are you so relaxed?’ I say ‘I don’t know, the car is fine, we’re having fun, I’m 45 now I need to relax and have fun I don’t care about the result.’ He said ‘no, no, no you’re lying’ but no I’m not lying, I don’t know, I’m just really super cool now. I don’t know why, other years I was really anxious, if I’m not fast what will happen? Now, I don’t care, I just want to have fun and we’ll see. Hopefully there won’t be any problems and we can be fast again. And second, yes for sure motorsport in Greece is really nice for me. We have a lot of people spectating as you’ve seen already on shakedown, and it’s really important to have you guys back in WRC, it’s really great for us. I hope the organisers will produce one of the best rallies in the calendar and you will all be happy to come back here next year. 

NON-PRIORITY DRIVER

Present:
Molly Taylor (AUS) 

Q:
Let’s turn to Molly Taylor in Rally3. We’ve seen you in action already at Rally Estonia, we’ve seen you in Extreme E where you’ve been doing exceptionally well. Let’s talk about the Rally3 car first and foremost and how much you’re looking forward to the challenge of the Acropolis, your first time here.

MT:
Yes, first time here. It’s one of those bucket-list events I looked at as a kid and always wanted to do, so to be here is fantastic. We knew it was going to be a challenge, we’ve got more challenges than I think everyone thought with the roads and conditions but it’s going to be a cool experience and that’s why we’re here. We’re here to learn and try and get all the kilometres in.

Q:
So many drivers have been doing training in heat tanks to get ready for this blistering heat and you turn up and it’s Rally GB. How much of a surprise was it on the recce?

MT:
Yeah it was really surprising, I think because the stages, the elevation is so high we’re really right in at the top of the mountains so it’s got its own climate up there. And even the fog on the recce, some of the stages we haven’t really seen in clear daylight so that’s certainly going to be interesting for me when we get to the rally and I suppose it’s always a rally where you have to drive smart and be adaptable to the conditions, usually in a different way but it’ll be the same thing here maybe just a bit more extreme.

Q:
Why pick the Acopolis Rally? You’re going to be doing Finland as well so some iconic events there, why Acropolis?

MT:
Yeah we like to try all the challenges and given the mix of events for the Rally3 car as well, the two different extremes of gravel events on the calendar and also fit in well with my calendar, my Extreme E commitments as well. A combination of reasons I suppose but it was something I was very keen to do.

Q:
Tell me about the Rally3 car and how you’re finding it.

MT:
Yeah the Rally3 car is a really impressive little package. I think it’s a great entry level four-wheel-drive car, the chassis is really impressive so it’s fun to drive, it’s quite easy to get in and get confidence quite quickly and obviously it’s always more work, trying to get that last bit but it’s really something you can jump in and very quickly feel at home in which is nice. So yeah, looking forward to getting some more kilometres in than we did in Estonia.

Q:
We’ll gloss over that! Given it’s your first time here, have you been getting any advice from anyone on how to deal with the conditions?

MT:
I think it’s just about driving smart, it’s not necessarily about trying to go for outright pace and for us the most important thing is to get a clean rally and drive with that in mind. So it’s certainly one where we have to respect a lot, we don’t have a big battle on our hands like these guys for any championships or anything so really it gives us the ability to be able to focus on our own race and try and drive smart, try and show what the Rally3 car can do and get it to the end.

Q:
What’s going to be the most challenging day here in terms of the stages? What’s the key day for you?

MT:
Gosh I think it depends on how much it dries out as well, I think. Friday when we recced it was dry, don’t know what those stages are going to look like when we get to them tomorrow but then Saturday and some of the stages on Sunday are a real challenge. There’s also a mix of some really nice, beautiful, flowing wide hillclimbs and then we’ve got some of the tougher tests which I can’t pronounce! But some of the stages on Saturday are going to be quite tough.

Q:
You’ve had a slice of WRC action again this year. Is this wetting your appetite for a bigger programme next year, is that the plan?

MT:
It’s really nice to be back in the WRC, it’s been a long time out so it’s cool to come back and experience it all again. It reminds you just what a special sport this is, particularly at this level, and also what a challenge it is and how much longer and tougher the stages are. It’s a huge challenge to respect and I mean, it would be great to be back here more. That would be awesome. There’s a lot of things that would have to happen and come together for that to be possible, but that would be amazing.

Q:
That was a great political answer, I’m glad you gave me a yes or no at the end of it… So it is a yes then?

MT:
Well if anyone wants to help out then I’m all ears!

Questions from the floor

Frantzis Georgios, F1fan.gr (GR)

Q:
Do you see Acropolis as the perfect opportunity to prove yourself, given that it is arguably one of the toughest challenges in rallying?

MT:
I mean you want to do your best every time you go out, so that’s really all I can do is put my best foot forward and try and make the most of the experience, and I think that’s the same every time I go out. But for sure the Acropolis is particularly challenging so I think it’s a challenge for all the drivers but from my side as well, try to make sure I can do a good job in every condition.