WRC STAR BREEN UP FOR RALLY CROSS START

Super car run fuels interest but testing vital

World Rally Championship refugee Craig Breen is considering trying rallycross this season following a first Supercar test at Mondello Park in his native Ireland last week.

Breen drove double European champion Derek Tohill’s Ford Fiesta Supercar at the Irish Rallycross Championship launch and completed around 10 laps at the County Kildare venue.

“I just did a handful of laps but it was definitely something different,” Breen told Motorsport News. “I didn’t do enough to get completely into how exactly everything works, but the power is like something I’ve never driven before. The car felt nice, I could do everything I wanted with it.”

The two-time WRC podium finisher and former Junior world champion says he has opportunities to compete in rallycross this season. “I do have some options to do something in rallycross this year, but it wouldn’t be my number one priority,” he said. “Obviously I want to go back rallying again, that’s my first love. But definitely I’d like to try [rallycross], I enjoyed driving a Supercar and I’d like to have a race in one. If it works out, it would be great.”

While the 29-year-old hasn’t revealed where he could race, he says a testing programme will be a must before any competitive outing.

“It doesn’t make sense [not to] especially if I don’t have any experience in a car like that to just land on a race weekend,” said Breen. “Because of the limited amount of time in the car you get in a race weekend it would take nearly the whole time to get my head around it.”

Breen also sampled Tohill’s Euro RX title-winning rear-wheel-drive Ford Fiesta at the IRX launch.