[Auto] Mikkelsen awaits his return to the top flight at M-Sport Ford

[SougarLord]

 

The Norwegian says the British team's track record in handling regulatory changes makes it the ideal place when a hybrid-powered Rally1 formula replaces World Rally Cars as the top category in 2022.

 

"M-Sport would be a really good place to be in 2022," Mikkelsen said.

 

“If you look back, do you remember 2017? It seems like M-Sport is always really strong right out of the box and then maybe the other manufacturers with the bigger budgets are picking up a bit afterwards. I want to be in first class again and, as I said, M-Sport is a very good place to be.

 

The British team was the fastest to break off the blocks when the final incarnation of the World Rally Car regulations was introduced in 2017. Sébastien Ogier scored a dominant victory in a Fiesta at Rallye Monte-Carlo that opened the season.

Mikkelsen added that he feels he has a lot to offer in terms of continued development with the new car for the M-Sport Ford 22.

 

"I have a lot of experience in car development," Mikkelsen said. “I have worked a lot with Škoda, Citroen, Hyundai and, of course, Volkswagen. I worked with the 2012 Polo [R WRC] and did a lot of development driving that car.

 

“One of the things that I have learned from developing cars is that you need the car to run in as wide a window as possible. You need a fairly neutral car and this is what we had with the Polo and that's why it worked as well as it did.

 

Mikkelsen is driving for Toksport in WRC2 this season and while his focus remains handing over the WRC2 title to the Germany-based Škoda team, he is more than ready to step back to a World Rally Car should a manufacturer hit.

 

He dominated WRC2 at the season opener at Rally Monte Carlo, then finished second to Esapekka Lappi's Volkswagen Polo R5 in the second half at the Arctic Rally Finland. He leads by 24 points in the third round of Rally Croatia (April 22-25).