Adrien Fourmaux will start the opening round of the British Rally Championship, next month’s Malcolm Wilson Rally.
The factory M-Sport Ford driver will run a Ford Fiesta Rally2 on the team’s home event – and might well be seen on further British rounds later in the season.
Fourmaux is no stranger to the Malcolm Wilson Rally or to competing in Cumbria, having won the event in 2020 and starred in M-Sport’s own Return to Rally Stages (a one-off event to help kick-start British rallying during the COVID-19 pandemic) later that same season.
Explaining the Frenchman’s presence on the BRC season-opener, M-Sport managing director Malcolm Wilson told DirtFish: “It’s a good opportunity for us to work on the development of the car and for Adrien to get more seat time.
“We’ve development coming and the Fiesta is improving all of the time, this is just another step in that process. We want to be at the front with this car.”
Asked if there was any chance of a season-long BRC challenge from M-Sport, Wilson added: “Well, he’s certainly going to start round one. At the moment we don’t really have any plans for anything beyond that.”
Wilson is, of course, no stranger to success on the opening round of Britain’s premier series. He dominated the 1985 National Breakdown Rally at the wheel of an Audi Quattro, leading Russell Brookes’ Opel Manta 400 home by almost two minutes after four hours’ competition through the Yorkshire forests.
