The World Rally Championship is one of the most popular motorsport competitions in the world, perhaps the second one after Formula One. It is the sport where Sebastien Loen was undisputed king for the past decade and, next to him, Citroen was the brand that basically ruled a competition where the manufacturers’ list became smaller and smaller each year.
Following the financial turmoil of the late 2000’s, out of the eight constructors that were competing before 2008, only three remained, some of them being unofficially involved. Mini seemed to bring life back to the competition when the Mini Countryman WRC joined in 2011, but their presence was brief as budget was cut for the 2011 and 2012 seasons.
The ones to save the situation were Volkswagen, who announced their return for the 2013 season. The German carmaker had very well planned strategy and also taking advantage of Loeb stepping down, so Volkswagen Motorsport won the Championship in the first year, both the Drivers’ (Sebastien Ogier) and the Manufacturers’.
And things seemed to get even better when Hyundai also announced their return to WRC back in 2012 at the Paris Motor Show, after a 10 year hiatus. Toyota also plans on making their comeback, this time with a racing car based on the Yaris, but haven’t decided yet when this comeback will take place.
During an event that took place in early December 2013 at the Hyundai Motor Europe headquarters in the German town of Offenbach, the Korean manufacturer unveiled the full team and the car that started competing in this year’s edition of WRC. They clearly pointed out that 2014 will be a season for adapting to the competition (and that we can see), so this was the reason they decided to use an impressive number of four crews to get the best out of the new Hyundai i20 WRC racing car.
Hyundai’s first attempt
As you probably know, this is not the first time Hyundai is trying to make an impression in the World Rally Championship. Their first attempt took place 14 years ago, when the Hyundai Coupe entered the world’s leading rally competition. For two seasons, 1998 and 1999, the Hyundai Coupe Kit Car and Hyundai Coupe Kit Car Evo2 competed in the F2 class, being driven by Kenneth Eriksson (1998, 1999), Wayne Bell (1998) and Alister McRae (1998 and 1999), brother of famous Scottish driver Colin McRae.
Since the Hyundai Coupe only had front wheel drive and could only compete in the F2 class, the South Korean manufacturer decided it was time to hit the big league, so in September 1999 the Hyundai Accent WRC was introduced as the racing car of the Hyundai World Rally Team. The team kept the same drivers, Eriksson and McRae, with the car making its competition debut in 2000, at the Swedish Rally. However, Hyundai was forced to face tough competition for the 2000 season, with many car manufacturers involved, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Ford, Seat, Peugeot and Skoda, all looking to get as many trophies as possible. The Peugeot 206 was the best car of the season and Marcus Gronholm was the man to beat.
Under these circumstances, the Hyundai Castrol World Rally Team achieved their first top ten finish in the fifth stage of the season, the Rally Argentina, when McRae finished 7th and Eriksson 8th. That season, best results were achieved in New Zealand (5th place by the Swede) and Australia (4th place by the same Eriksson). The team finished second to last, scoring the same number of points as the last team, Skoda Motorsport.
For the 2001 season, Hyundai worked on an improved version of the Accord WRC and also brought two new drivers, former World Champion Juha Kankkunen and experienced Italian driver Piero Liatti. But despite these team additions and the car obviously being better, is still couldn’t represent a threat for Peugeot, Mitsubishi, Ford and Subaru. So with only a 4th place in the British Rally by McRae (the best result yet) and two other 6th places (McRae in Portugal and Eriksson in Great Britain) the team once again tied with Skoda for the last place.
The 2002 season once again saw Hyundai improving the Accent WRC and also making significant changes to the team. Kenneth Eriksson left Hyundai to join Skoda, while Alister McRae moved to Marlboro Mitsubishi Ralliart. The two drivers were replaced by Belgian driver Freddy Loix (whose best result was a 2nd place in the 1998 Rally Catalunya and a 3rd place the same year, in Portugal) and Armin Schwarz who won the 1991 Rally Catalunya and also achieved several other podium finished during his 14 year career. Besides the two new drivers, the team also kept Juha Kankkunen.
Despite all these changes, the team still didn’t get any significant results, the best ones being a 5th place by Kankkunen in New Zealand and a 6th place by Loix in the same stage. However, it was the first time Hyundai managed to overtake not only Skoda, but Mitsubishi too in the Manufacturers’ Championship. By just one point but still, they finished the season fourth.
2003 was Hyundai’s last season in the World Rally Championship, as the team was already struggling with financial difficulties and poor results. Juha Kankkunen decided to step down from the down and was replaced by Jussi Valimaki, a driver whose best result when he joined Hyundai was a 13th place in 2000 Rally Finland. Loix and Schwarz remained with the team, but results were extremely poor. The German’s best performance was in Cyprus (7th place), while the Belgian’s best results was an 8th place in Australia. Valimaki entered four races but failed to finish any of them. The Hyundai World Rally Team finished the 2003 season last, being outranked by Skoda Motorsport with twice as many points and, at the end of the season, announced their retirement from WRC, planning a return for the 2007 season, a return which never took place.
Following their WRC abandon, Hyundai didn’t retire from motorsport completely and was involved in several other competitions, especially in the United States. In 2009, New Zealand driver Rhys Millen drove a specially developed Hyundai Genesis Coupe at several events, including the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb and the Formula Drift Professional Drifting Championship. The South Korean carmaker also built a rally and cross-rally racing car based on the Hyundai Veloster, which was driven by the same Rhys Millen. The all wheel drive car was powered by 500 hp 2.0-liter engine and Millen drove it in the Summer X Games during the 2011 US Rallycross Championship Series.
The comeback
But the big news came at the 2012 Paris Motor Show, when the South Korean carmaker announced their comeback for the 2014 season, with a car based on the Hyundai i20. 2013 was the year when the Hyundai Motorsport team began taking shape. Gyoo-Heon Choi was named president of Hyundai Motorsport, the headquarters were moved to a new location near Frankfurt and Michel Nandan became the man in charge with the rally team. Nandan is an important name in WRC, working in the past for teams like Peugeot, Toyota and Suzuki. During his spell, Toyota won 27 rallies and Peugeot 24. Right now, the Alzenau development facility employs 90 people from 18 countries, the technical staff being made mostly of French and German engineers.
As we mentioned earlier, the car chosen for Hyundai’s WRC comeback was the i20. What sounded a little strange was that Hyundai announced they will be using it for only one season, with another model being scheduled to replace it starting with the 2015 season. Despite not really making any sense, it probably has something to do with the carmaker planning on introducing a new i20 generation this year.
As for the current Hyundai i20 WRC, the car is powered by a 1.6-liter turbocharged engine that produces 300 hp at 6,000 rpm and 295 lb-ft of torque (400 Nm) at 5,000 rpm. Power is sent to all four wheels via a six-speed sequential transmission, electronics are provided by Magneti Marelli and the seats come from Sabelt. The car was tested in 2013 by Juho Hanninen, Chris Atkinson, Bryan Bouffier and even Marcus Gornholm and as soon as it started to take shape, they also announced the official drivers for the 2014 season. The lineup was pretty promising, with Thierry Neuville as lead driver and Dani Sordo, Juho Hanninen and Chris Atkinson sharing the team’s second entry. Neuville had finished the 2013 season second, while Dani Sordo had a few great years at Citroen, with plenty of podium finishes and achieved his first win in 2013 in Germany.
So far, it’s a little too early to evaluate Hyundai’s performance. Both Neuville and Sordo retired from the first stage, the Monte Carlo Rally, but Neuville achieved the first podium for the team in the third round, a 3rd place in the Rally Mexico (Atkinson came 7th). Results in the other rounds were not great, but Michel Nandan clearly stated that this season’s main objective is for the team to finish as many stages as possible and to accumulate experience for 2015, when Hyundai Motorsport has big plans and wants to fight for the World Championship.
The conclusion is that we’re really glad to see Hyundai making their comeback to the World Rally Championship and even though they’re not getting any results so far, the fact that the competition in WRC is toughening up is good news, because the more the merrier in what’s probably one of the most spectacular motorsports on the planet.
