Filed under: Comment
According to a report from British racing car magazine Autosport today, MINI have finally confirmed their entry into the 2012 World Rally Championship (WRC).However, with the announcement before Christmas, that the Oxfordshire-based team is only planning to run one of its two factory drivers in every round of the 2012 season, there's a rather hollow feeling to the news.
Has sister company BMW gone cold on the WRC already I wonder? Well, the Munich-based company is known to be unhappy at the amount of coverage in Germany of the WRC.
Also, despite having a contract to run the factory cars until the end of next season, the relationship between BMW and Prodrive is strained.
Still, I supposed we should be grateful MINI are going to there be at the start in France, with the talented Dani Sordo at the wheel. Even if it could be left to MINI-owning privateers to do the most expensive rallies such as New Zealand.
We shall see what happens in due course I expect, but I do question BMW's commitment and budget for the 2012 WRC season.