Hyundai makes promising start with four-car entry at fast and furious Rally Poland

— The Hyundai Motorsport team has begun its first ever four-car event in the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) in trouble-free style in Poland today
— All four Hyundai i20 WRC cars have run smoothly in the opening nine stages of this rally with the #20 of Hayden Paddon ending the first full day in the top five
— Thierry Neuville is also in the fight for the top five after an encouraging day, with Dani Sordo and Kevin Abbring also making progress during Friday’s ultra fast stages.

Hyundai Motorsport has had a trouble-free opening day to this weekend’s Rally Poland, round seven of the 2015 FIA World Rally Championship (WRC), with all four of the entered Hyundai i20 WRC cars.

The majority of stages have been re-profiled for this year’s Rally Poland, offering teams and drivers a step into the unknown on some of the Championship’s fastest gravel stages. For Hyundai Motorsport, there are added challenges this weekend as the team fields four cars in a WRC event for the first time.

Thierry Neuville (#7 Hyundai i20 WRC) and Dani Sordo (#8 Hyundai i20 WRC) are competing as usual for the Hyundai Shell World Rally Team. Meanwhile, Hayden Paddon (#20 Hyundai i20 WRC) has been joined by the team’s test driver Kevin Abbring (#10 Hyundai i20 WRC) under the Hyundai Mobis World Rally Team banner for the first of four programmed rallies for the Dutchman.

Fresh from his debut WRC podium in Sardinia, Paddon had a strong opening to Rally Poland with a number of top-five stage times throughout the day to finish fifth overall after Friday’s 155km of competitive stages.

Paddon said: “The stages today have been really enjoyable and challenging in equal measure. We struggled initially to pick up a rhythm and the pace notes were not working as well as we’d hoped. Things didn’t really gel as I had expected but we had some better runs this afternoon with a good tyre choice, particularly using the hard tyres on the long stage. It hasn’t been a bad day overall. We are in a close fight for the top five, so we have to keep our focus and continue to gain more confidence on these stages.”

Neuville, who also scored a podium in Rally Italia Sardegna, is also hunting down a top-five position overall after a hard-fought day for the Belgian on the fast, new-look Polish stages.

Neuville commented: “All in all it has been an okay day for us and I have been pleased with my driving, and the general performance of the car. These new-look stages are very fast and we have struggled at times, like many others, with our pace notes. That’s something we’ve worked on during the day. This afternoon, it was very important to manage the tyres. We had a good run in the long stage but we lost a bit of time in the penultimate stage, but that was acceptable in the circumstances. We are in a close fight and will look to make some more improvements tomorrow.”

Sordo has not had the easiest of starts to his Rally Poland but the Spaniard has made steady progress during today’s two loops to be just outside the top eight.

Sordo said: “To be honest, it was not such a good day. The stages have been very fast with a lot of crests, which have been difficult to master with the pace notes. I didn’t have so much confidence for this morning, which affected our loop. The afternoon was a bit better to begin with but the subsequent stages were all about tyre management. We need to do better tomorrow but we’ll sit down with the team this evening to see what improvements we can make.”

In his second WRC event of 2015, and the first of four scheduled rounds, Abbring is on a steep learning curve, so it’s been a valuable and productive opening day for the Dutchman.

Abbring said: “It’s been a fantastic day with some truly amazing stages. The fast nature of the stages is perhaps not the easiest for us in our first of four scheduled rallies, but it’s been a fun learning curve. We have improved the pace notes throughout the day and have also worked around some brake issues. In the afternoon, we were still finding improvements but, in some sections, we could push the car a bit more to its limits. I’m looking forward to another enjoyable day tomorrow.”

Hyundai Motorsport has adapted well to engineering four cars on a WRC event for the first time, particularly with no lunchtime service. The team has laid good foundations for the rest of the weekend and will hope for more of the same from its four driver crews tomorrow.

Team Principal Michel Nandan said: “This is a special rally for our team as we enter four Hyundai i20 WRC cars into a rally for the first time. And what a fast rally it is proving to be! These new stages are offering us some of the fastest, most challenging stages of the season with our crews needing to constantly refine and improve their pace notes. All four of our crews have acquitted themselves very well, and it’s good to see Hayden and Thierry in a close fight for the top five after the first day. Dani and Kevin, too, have had different targets today but it is fantastic to see four cars in our service area. The team has done a commendable job to adapt to having the additional car and it’s a real testament to how much we’ve grown as a team in a short space of time. I hope we can continue in this way tomorrow.”

Saturday’s itinerary will see a loop of four stages in the morning- Mazury 17.70km, Wieliczki 12.87km, Swietajno 21.25km and Paprotki 23.15km – with the first three repeated in the afternoon run before an evening Super Special once again to be held at the Mikolajki Arena. All in all, 129.29km of special stages will greet drivers on the final full day of this weekend’s Rally Poland.