Arminen wins Subaru Individual Award

Teemu Arminen has become the latest winner of the Subaru Individual Award after finishing sixth overall on Rally d’Italia-Sardigna last weekend.

Driving a Tommi Makinen Racing-built Impreza WRX for the Italian Motoring Club team, Arminen impressed throughout the two-day gravel event, round five of the Intercontinental Rally Challenge.

Arminen, from Finland, and co-driver Tuomo Nikkola, ran in the top-five for much of the rally but decided to drop back in the closing stages in order to secure maximum points in the Italian Gravel Trophy, which was running alongside the main IRC event.

"This is a great result for me," said Arminen, who was more than one minute clear of fellow Subaru driver Luigi Ricci at the finish in Porto Cervo on Sunday evening. "We started as fast as possible but when our competitors in the Italian Gravel Trophy crashed and had some problems we decided to take the double points by driving safely."

The Subaru Individual Award is presented on each of the 12 IRC rounds this year to the highest-placed Subaru finisher and demonstrates the support that Subaru will extend to its customer drivers in the IRC in 2010.

Swiss Olivier Burri (Monte Carlo), Juan San Martin (Curitiba), Gabriel Pozzo (Argentina) and Jose Barrios (Canary Islands) are the other Subaru Individual Award winners so far this season.