TheWill the nine-time French world champion win 81e Victory in WRC on the Lostian Roads? Sebastien Loeb will return to the World Rally Championship in Portugal, May 19-22, on the steering wheel of an M-Sport Ford, with Isabel Galmich as co-driver. He won in Monte Carlo at the age of eightye In the Queen class, Loeb, 48, will return to Portugal at 4e The season tour is part of the partial program that he concluded with M-Sport.
Never two without three?
Ten years after claiming his last nine world titles, a record, Loeb has been making some rallies in the World Rally Championship since 2013, but not an entire season. He missed in 2021, returning to Monte Carlo in 2022 with a new record, becoming the oldest driver to win a World Tour (47 years 10 months). In Portugal, where he won in 2007 and 2009, he will still be accompanied by France’s Isabel Galmish, who, in Monte Carlo, became the first female assistant driving to win the WRC Rally since 1997.
“Driving a Puma is one of my fondest rally memories; winning the Monte Carlo after such a long time was incredible,” Loeb explained to M-Sport. This version of the rally is in 2019, so I have a base of notes for certain stages,” he said, adding that the choice of Portugal was “very simple”, because he wanted to “do a rally on gravel”.
Will Ogier come to take revenge?
Another Frenchman who became a master of the discipline, Sebastien Ogier, could also be there in Portugal. It also became a luxury independent, 8 years latere Last year, Ogier gave the answer to Loeb in Monte-Carlo, where he lost in the final kilometres, and Gapençais then announced that his next rally with Toyota would undoubtedly be in Portugal. Loeb lined up this season in several disciplines, between the Dakar, the World Rally Championship, the Extreme E Championship for electric cars, and at least the opening round, in Portugal at the end of April, of the German Grand Prix. (DTM). The presence of Loeb and Ogier will be in the spotlight for WRC, as he was dominated after 2 rounds by Finnish youngster Kalle Rovanperä, before 3e Tour of Croatia this weekend.
