Ostberg pins Portugal podium hopes on test

Mads Ostberg is confident he will have a shot at getting back on the podium on the next round of the 2012 FIA World Rally Championship powered by Nokia in Portugal after implementing some ideas for steps forward in a pre-rally test.

The Adapta World Rally Team driver started 2012 brightly with third place in Sweden, which he followed up with a fourth-place finish in Mexico earlier this month in the Ford Fiesta RS WRC he shares with co-driver Jonas Andersson.

Last year Ostberg scored podiums in Sweden and Great Britain. However, he struggled on occasion as he learned a host of new events with limited opportunities for pre-event testing

But the Norwegian is optimistic that the chance to do some more testing before Vodafone Rally de Portugal will allow him to challenge the frontrunners again.

“I am looking forward to doing some testing with the car ahead of Portugal because we were trying a lot of different things [in Mexico],” said Ostberg. “We will try some new strategies and a few things with the set-up of the car.

“I think we can still improve the car a lot and for sure I can improve as well so hopefully we can fight for a podium in Portugal."

The 24-year-old admitted that Mexico hadn’t quite lived up to expectations in pace terms, even though his final result was better than he had expected.

“It was a tricky event for sure. It was a bit up and down for us,” Ostberg said. “We came to fight for fifth and hopefully challenge some of the factory drivers. Okay, we challenged them on some stages but not overall.”