Andreas Mikkelsen took advantage of the days leading up to Rally Italia-Sardinia to carry out a test day with the Ford Fiesta WRC of the Finnish team JanPro Racing, owned by Jahne Tuohino. The Norwegian got back into a premier class car after his tests with the Citroën C3 WRC.
There were several rumors that the Norwegian would test the car with the aim of a possible arrival at Ford in 2022. However, the day was directed to continue testing the Pirelli tires on gravel, with the aim of obtaining more data on different compounds.
The Italian tire brand’s test driver first discovered the sensations on the M-Sport machine. Recall that since his entry into the WRC class in 2013, Mikkelsen worked for Volkswagen (Polo WRC), Citroën (C3 WRC) and ultimately Hyundai on board the i20 Coupé WRC.
Mikkelsen also provided data to JanPro Racing about his unit, taking advantage of one of the stops to change settings on the car in order to “cut” more easily at the entrance of the corners.
One of the car’s shock absorbers said enough during the afternoon, as detailed by the Norwegian in his last blog uploaded to YouTube. Although the intention was to repair and continue, it could not be. Mikkelsen explained the following, disgusted: “Finally we did not continue, it started to be very late and it was difficult to drive. For safety reasons we decided to stop. We need to do more mileage. The day did not go well, it is part of the game, but we have in mind more evidence”.
2021 will continue intense for Andreas Mikkelsen, who will participate with the Skoda Fabia Rally2 Evo of Toksport WRT in WRC2 (category that he leads at the moment) and in the European Championship. His next stop will be the Rally Latvia (ERC), his plans go, from 2022, to return to the WRC as an official driver.
Full blog of the test day:
