Hyundai is thinking of a long-term driver line-up finalization



The team principal of Hyundai Motorsport, Cyril Abiteboul, says that his team is considering of confirming its driver line-up when the time is ripe, but it will be a long-term agreement, and is currently reviewing their possible options.

Hyundai Motorsport has announced Esapekka Lappi and Thierry Neuville with a full programme while Dani Sordo and Craig Breen have a partial campaign for 2023. It is hinted that Sordo will not compete in all the remaining WRC rounds of the season after Breen's death which means that the Koreans must find another crew for the third i20N as Estonia and Finland are not the favorite rallies for the Spaniard. Kris Meeke is a potential candidate to share the third car with Sordo as the first one signed a contract with Hyundai Portugal recently replacing Breen on the Portuguese championship. Last but not least, another option is a youngster who will have the opportunity to compete against the top drivers in World Rally Championship, like Oliver Solberg did it last year. The WRC2 team of Hyundai includes Fabrizio Zaldivar and Teemu Suninen who has experience at the top level as he had been M-Sport Ford driver for years and replace Ott Tanak in Monza 2021 with the i20 Coupe WRC.

"One thing that I can confirm is that Dani will not be doing all of the rallies and our line-up will be announced in due course and is in the process of being built", Abiteboul said.

"We are looking into it but it is too early to make a particular announcement. 

"The only thing I can say is that we are not just looking into this year we are looking at where we want to be next year and the year after that.

"I don't want to see the exercise that we have to do in a very unfortunate circumstance as a gap filling exercise. 

"I want to see that as a strategic decision for the team and for the company.

"We have got hope and expectation to be here for the long term, that is why we can only look at this question of driver line-up for the remainder of this season with the perspective of a long-term impact on the team".


Source: Motorsport.com


Photo Credits: Hyundai

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