Hyundai Motorsport has confirmed Ott Tänak and Thierry Neuville will drive a pair of i20 Coupe WRCs at the Rally di Alba, which starts next month.
The Italian event will mark Tänak’s asphalt debut in the Hyundai and his first time competing with an asphalt set-up car since his spectacular crash at the season-opening Monte Carlo Rally.
They will be joined by Dani Sordo and Jari Huttunen. Two-time WRC round winner Sordo will drive a BRC-prepared i20 R5, while Huttunen takes the wheel of Hyundai’s development R5. That means two rallies in two weeks for Sordo, who will have driven an i20 Coupe WRC at Rally di Roma the previous weekend (July 24-26).
Hyundai is no stranger to Rally di Alba, with Sébastien Loeb taking a two-minute win at the northern Italian event 12 months ago.
Hyundai’s planning for both asphalt rallies in Rome and Alba began some weeks ago, but with a proposal for three of the last four rounds of this year’s WRC set to run on asphalt, the opportunity for some fine-tuning of the i20 on sealed surfaces will be welcome.
“We want to do something, we want to make some show,” Hyundai Motorsport team principal Andrea Adamo told DirtFish. “We always have a nice welcome in Alba and it’s sensible to do this event after Rome as well.”
