Ligato chasing championships before retirement

39-year old Argentine competition team chief, Marcos Ligato, is looking to retire from active rally driving by the time he reaches 40, which is on November 22.  

Marcos Ligato at Rally Australia in Perth in 2003. (Photo: Maurice Selden)He has two final challenges left in his career. He would like to win the FIA regional Codasur championship for a second time (he is currently lying second behind his Skoda teammate Gustavo Saba), and the national Argentino Maxi Rally series for a fourth successive time, in which at present he is lying second behind Geronimo Padilla.  

It is a race against time, because the final rounds of both series come just after his birthday …   

This has been Marcos’ 21st season in rallying, which internationally had started spectacularly on his debut WRC event, 1998 Rally Argentina, when he rolled on the opening super special.  His car remained inverted in front of the grandstands till every car had passed.   

Special rules limited his time loss penalty and he went on to finish the top placed Argentine driver.  

In his career he won the PCWRC category in Finland in 2001 and New Zealand in 2010.  His big step forward was founding the Tango Competicion team in 2008 and launching the Chevrolet Agile MR rally programme.
 
- Martin Holmes 

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