Ford Europe president Jim Baumbick has offered a deeper insight into the decision to return the Blue Oval to the World Rally Championship in 2028.
Absent as a factory team since the end of 2012, Ford will spend the next two years preparing an all-new product line to reflect the emotion and heritage the brand brings to both road and stage.
Baumbick said: “What we do, at our best, is we design and manufacture thrill. What I love about the powerhouse that Mark [Rushbrook, Ford Racing global director] has put together is [that] he takes it and he puts it on the absolute extreme, makes it better, and then we wire it right back into the soul of every product that we sell.
“And that’s how we think we can differentiate in a market here in Europe. It’s an open market to Chinese OEMs, there’s going to be 150 brands. But what they don’t have is that emotion. They don’t have that heritage. They don’t have Ford Racing [and] that actually is driving a very clear point of differentiation in their passenger vehicle portfolios.
We're not going to build toasters on wheelsJim Baumbick
“We’ve been working on this for some time. You know, it’s one thing to make a declaration and say you’re going to position a product in a certain way. What we do is, if we’re in it, we’re all-in.
“You’ve heard me say a couple of times that we’re not going to build toasters on wheels. We’ve tried that for many years. It doesn’t work. That’s not us. We are at our best when we’re building things like Mustang and like Raptor and like this rally-bred portfolio or Bronco. Those are all things that actually allow us to just be who we are. And I think customers appreciate it.”
Ford Racing’s all-new 2029 WRC challenger will come from a rally inspired road car range, with the first of five new passenger vehicles expected in 2028.
