Irishman Craig Breen, who secured his first full-time seat in the FIA World Rally Championship, will be coming to Rally Sweden in a comfortable position after he managed to take home a third place finish on the season-opener in Rallye Monte-Carlo.
Driving for M-Sport Ford World Rally Team, Breen is currently sitting fourth in the Drivers’ Championship after the first round, albeit second if you count-out the two Frenchmen of Sébastien Loeb and Sébastien Ogier who are only driving part-time in the championship.
Together with co-driver Paul Nagle, the duo have a strong track record on snow and Breen will be keen to bring home another great result and hopefully a second consecutive podium finish.
Credit: M-Sport Ford World Rally Team
As the rally moves north of Sweden for this year’s edition and onwards to secure more snow, Breen is excited to try out the new-for-all rally stages; “I’m really excited to discover a new rally in Umea. I’ve done the rally many times before in Torsby, but it’ll be completely new this time, and I’m looking forward to having some great conditions. This is the first rally on loose surfaces with the new cars and the Puma hybrid, so hopefully it’ll be good.“
On Friday when the rally starts, the Irishman will be the second car out on the stages after Toyota Gazoo Racing’s Kalle Rovanperä and Breen will then be facing challenging conditions.
“Obviously, we start near the front of the road on the first stage, so that will be something new for me to discover. Being second car on the road will be not the best conditions but honestly, it’s a challenge I’m looking forward to. It comes with having a good championship position, so at the end of the day it’s good for that reason.“
“I’m hoping for a good event, trying to build more confidence with the car like we did in Monte Carlo, and to see if we can get another strong result; the most important thing is to keep the championship position strong heading into Croatia, so let’s see how it goes.”