Monte is “worst performance of my career” – Greensmith

M-Sport driver, currently slowest of WRC runners and behind two Rally2 cars, says he's not enjoying a "single thing"

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Gus Greensmith has labeled his early 2021 Monte Carlo Rally form the “worst performance of my career” with “99% of it” down to his driving.

Greensmith is competing on his third Monte Carlo Rally, his second in a top-spec Ford Fiesta WRC, and is currently 11th overall after five stages.

The 24-year-old’s previous Monte form is mixed, with a superb WRC2 Pro victory and seventh overall on his first visit in 2019 but an embarrassing accident ruining his event 12 months ago.

Greensmith, who is driving the sole-surviving M-Sport Fiesta WRC after his team-mate Teemu Suninen’s weekend ending crash on Thursday, is 21 seconds behind fellow youngster Pierre-Louis Loubet and 17.6s shy of Takamoto Katsuta, but all three trail Andreas Mikkelsen and Adrien Fourmaux’s Rally2 cars overall.

“I wish I had the answer to why it’s gone so wrong but I don’t so I’ll do my best to get it right,” Greensmith said in the media zone after the Friday morning loop.

“I just don’t enjoy a single thing right now. You can’t learn in a ditch so that’s probably the only positive.”

When asked what he thought the factors were in his slump in confidence, Greensmith responded: “I’d say it’s probably so far the worst performance of my entire career so I think it must be quite a few factors but I’d say 99% of it is just the driver.

“It’s just me, I’ve got to fix it.”

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Conditions on Friday have been challenging, with ice on the rally’s third stage and then loose gravel on the fifth creating a testing mix.

But Greensmith said he did not see this as an excuse.

“I’ve won here before [in WRC2 Pro],” he added.

“Usually when I see conditions like that I think, ‘Great, I can make some time up’ but at the moment when I get to them, just zero confidence.

“When you’re behind WRC2 cars you shouldn’t really be in one of those [Rally1] cars so I don’t know, I’ll just try and get better.”

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