Former World Rally Championship driver Sean Johnston is hoping to find a way to bring a Citroën C3 Rally2 out to a round of this year’s ARA National Championship presented by Kubota.
Driving a Peugeot 208 Rally4, Johnston took a debut class win at last weekend’s Olympus Rally. The Shelton-based event was only his second start on his native soil, but he’s confident it won’t be his last.
“We have enough money to come back here for another round,” he told DirtFish. “It’s most likely this is going to be Tennessee (Overmountain Rally, September 20/21). Ideally I would like to find a way to persuade Stellantis to bring a Citroën C3 Rally2 out here.
“It’s a matter of figuring that equation out – we’re working on it.”
Asked if he thought he could be competitive against defending champion Brandon Semenuk’s Open class Subaru WRX ARA25 in Tennessee, the former Monte Carlo Rally class winer said: “It’s tough. I think it depends on the profile of the stage. It depends on the conditions. Maybe the Subarus are just a next step above, I mean, for me, they’re more like a Rally 2-plus or Rally1-minus when you look at the components in there.
“Yeah, they’re absolutely amazing rally cars. And so are Rally2 [cars], just not to the same extent and when you look at the cost it takes for a manufacturer to make [an Open class car] there’s a discrepancy there as well.
“When you look at what Josh McErlean did at Overmountain last year, picking up some stage wins, it’s possible. It’s got to be very tight and twisty, the kind of place where the Subarus aren’t able to really open it up use the torque, power and longer gearing.”
If Johnston’s not able to make the Rally2 car happen, he’s looking forward to a return to Johnson City, Tennessee, where he was able to put a Ford Fiesta Rally3 on the overall podium with third place last year.
“It’s just great to be rallying in America again,” he said. “The 208 was probably the most fun and rewarding front-wheel drive car I’ve used. We lost the power steering when a belt came off – and that just happened to be on about the twistiest stage of the event, but that’s what we go to the gym for!”
Johnston’s success follows Calle Carlberg’s domination of the O2WD category at 100 Acre Wood last month in the Team FJ Peugeot.