M-Sport’s chief engineer, Chris Williams, has explained the technical work necessary to restore the speed of the team’s number one driver, Mads Ostberg, as recently witnessed at the slow speed Rally Sardinia.
He said: “When you know what the problem is, it’s easy to find a solution, but in this case there was no obvious problem. It has been a time-consuming process in which we’ve made a number of small improvements to the hardware and software configurations.
“There wasn’t one simple solution, so it has been a case of making a number of small adjustments and it looks as though the car is much more to Mads’ liking now.
“It has been a real team effort with many engineers involved, both on and off event. It’s great to see that the hard work has paid off with Mads much happier and a lot closer to the pace we’d expect.”
Now the team anxiously waits to see to what extent improvement with downshifting will help performance on the ultra fast rallies in Poland and Finland, where good top end torque is important and where any poorer top end torque demands more downshifting.
It appears that some of Mads’ problems are explained by his aggressive style of left-foot braking that other drivers do not exhibit, in addition to his regulatory disadvantageous running position, which now should be eased with his better starting position in Poland.
The team has had to live with Mads’ downshifting problems earlier in the season on the slow speed Mexico, Argentina and Portugal events, and only recently have solutions been found. On the higher speed Swedish Rally, Mads finished on the podium.
- Martin Holmes
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