Q&A with David Richards

MINI is leading its first world championship round following a sensational effort by Dani Sordo on day one of Rallye de France Alsace.

With team-mate Kris Meeke in fourth, Wrc.com caught up with team chief David Richards to reflect on a strong day.

It’s MINI’s fourth appearance in the WRC. What has made the difference today?

“We were faster than everybody else! Nothing has changed. When we set out on our first event a few months ago we said this was a development year. We’ve quietly increased the pace and we’ve come to the fore towards the latter part of the season. The drivers haven’t done rallies for the best part of a year and Kris not consistently at this level either. It was always a case of being sensible and being realistic about what we should expect. The target was to be competitive from the start of next season. Perhaps we’ve exceeded that a little bit.”

Is it a genuine pace or have you benefited from the problems that have hit your rivals?

“It’s genuine pace and everybody can see the performance of the car. It’s now clearly the Citroens are a little bit faster than us but we’re clearly faster than the Fords. We know where the extra pace can come from the car over the next development phase.”

Are you planning to do anything different to the car tonight?

“No, just more of the same.”

How confident are you that Dani can stay in front on day two?

“It’s only our fourth ever event with this car - it’s way ahead of expectations. There’s considerably more to come.”

Kris is a bit behind Dani. Why is this?

“This is Kris’s first real experience at world championship level. He’s clearly proven his right to be here on performance. He’s holding down a very good pace considering his own experience here in France.”