Mick Patton has revealed that he will pilot a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X at the opening round of the season, the Quit Forest Rally, as he looks to have the maximum amount of fun from his rallying in 2015.
Patton, whose Repco Rally Team is based out of Canberra, has spent the past two seasons campaigning a front-wheel drive Volkswagen Polo. Between developing that car, and running an increasingly busy automotive business, Patton believes that leasing a car for the long distance opening round in WA would provide him and his team with the lowest stress, maximum fun return to kick the year off.
“Shipping a car and team to the first round in Western Australia is always a large undertaking so when the option to drive a WA based car appeared it quickly became the obvious choice,” said Mick.
Mick and his regular co-driver Bernie Webb will pilot a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X prepared by Perth based Race Torque Engineering, similar to that driven by Mark Pedder during last year’s APRC.
Having risen to prominence driving an all-wheel drive Subaru Impreza WRX, prior to his move to front-wheel drive, Patton said it would be exciting to drive the Mitsubishi in WA but it would also be his first time rallying that brand of car.
To prepare himself to the driving characteristics of being back behind the wheel of a four-wheel drive, turbo-charged rally car, Patton recently took advantage of a local Canberra test day to drive his former Subaru. “It was a good feeling to be back in the Subaru, after two year’s away from it, it felt comfortable pretty quickly.”
With his first round plans locked away Patton confirmed that he has a firm commitment to the remaining four rounds of the Championship, including his home round the National Capital Rally, International Rally of Queensland, Scouts Rally SA and the World Rally Championship round in Coffs Harbour.
“Our corporate partners Repco and Penrite Oils see involvement in the ECB ARC as a key string in their bows and as a team we have committed to the entire 2015 Championship,” commented Patton.
But will Patton continue down the four-wheel drive path or revert back to his front-wheel drive VW Polo?
“We have a number of options available at this point. We’re committed to the Championship but will wait until after WA to make any solid decisions around which car to enter in the remaining rounds,” he added.
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