After a long six week vacation, the World Rally Championship visits North America for the first time for the Rally Mexico. The drivers completed the initial recce yesterday, and the word from the top teams is that this will be a fast, technical rally, mixing the best of Finland and Cyprus. The rally will be a bit of crapshoot, as only Harri Rovanpera has any experience with the event (Sebastien Loeb took part in the recce for last year’s event, but he reckons it won’t count for much). The teams also have deal with the new tyre restrictions — factory teams had to choose two tread patterns before even leaving their home bases. The teams will also have to deal with a limited number of tyre changes.

Since this is a new rally, and not a specialized one at that, nearly every top driver has a shot at winning this thing. But let’s handicap the field….

Current world champion Petter Solberg has a good chance of getting his championship campaign back on track this weekend. The rally suits his style, and the Impreza is generally strong on this sort of event. The only thing that could hamper Solberg’s chances is the introduction of the 2004 Impreza at this rally. They’ve had plenty of time to test since Sweden, but there are no doubt a few bugs under the hood. If the car performs as promised, however, Solberg should find himself on the podium.

Citroen could be poised to sweep the top spots. Carlos Sainz, drawing on his decades of experience, always does well on new events (he won the inagural Rally Turkey last year, and the first run of Cyprus in 2000). He’s a disappointing season thus far, so he should be motivated. Seb Loeb has proven he’s just quick, regardless of the surface. The Xsara has been an ideal car, reliable and quick.

This rally could be the first real test for the new Peugeot 307. It has performed well thus far on the relatively docile season-opening rallies, so the rougher roads in Mexico should be a good test of the car’s reliability. Marcus Gronholm isn’t a fan of rougher rallies, but he should be motivated to perform well. Harri Rovanpera could drive himself right into a factory car for the rest of season with a win in Mexico (which Peugeot no doubt expects since he’s won here before). I don’t think the 307 will fair well, however, and neither driver will see a podium spot.

My Top 8
1. Petter Solberg
2. Carlos Sainz
3. Markko Martin
4. Sebastien Loeb
5. Marcus Gronholm
6. Gilles Panizzi
7. Francois Duval
8. Harri Rovanpera

Posted on 11 March 2004