Current rally championship leader Frenchman Sebastian Loeb and Norway’s Petter Solberg are expected to battle it out for the world crown at next week’s Cyprus Rally, officials said Thursday.
Clerk of Course Takis Kyriakides said that Loeb, driving a Citroen Xsara is ahead in the leaderboard with 35 points after winning Sunday’s Italian rally, following his victories in New Zealand and in the opener Monte Carlo.
This entitles him to be first off the ramp in the 1400 kilometre event of mostly dusty and winding 18 special stages that starts on Thursday and ends on Sunday.
Just one point behind is Subaru’s Solberg who won in Mexico and Sweden, and was runner up in Italy, starting second with a cloud of unsettled dust in front of him.
Peugeot’s team drivers Markko Martin of Estonia and Finland’s Marcus Gronholm will start third and fourth with Ford’s Toni Gardemeister of Finland fifth with a Focus, followed by Mistubishi’s Harri Rovanpera of Finland and Frenchman Gilles Panizzi.
Japan’s Toshi Arai, who leads the Production Car Championship, will be 25th off the start ramp in Limassol.
Among the rest will be Qatar’s Nasser Al Attiyah who leads the Middle East Championship and Oman’s Hamed Al Wahaibi, as well as two of Russia’s top drivers, Sergey Uspenskiy and Alexander Dorosinsky.
In all, 17 of the 60 entries are local drivers, with motorsport claiming the highest attendance and television viewership, despite the cash-strapped organising committee seeking to renew its license to host a World Rally Championship event for a third three-year contract.
“The fees to the world motorsport federation FIA have shot up from 34,000 to 150,000 euros this year,” said George Pavlides, Chairman of the organisers Cyprus Automobile Association.
He added that the financial strains were increased when the Cyprus Sports Organisation (KOA) cut its funding to the rally by CYP 50,000 to CYP 150,000 for this year.
The Cyprus Tourism Organisation put up the FIA fees, while state telecom provider Cytanet and other sponsors are putting up “significant amounts.”
“Last year we ended in the red, very much in the red,” added Pavlides, urging the government to pocket most of the event’s budget as it enjoys unprecedented free publicity in the world television markets.
Even the host town of Limassol nets several millions in earnings, with 500 journalists and 7,000 team members, officials and rally fans taking up hotel rooms in an otherwise quiet start of the year’s summer holiday season.
“There are six contenders, including Portugal, Jordan and South Africa that are vying for a place in next year’s World Rally Championship calendar, so all eyes will be on Cyprus to make sure it succeeds and retains this privilege for another three years,” said Kyriakides.
He added that the other candidate events have recruited the likes of princes and sheiks, spending millions in their bids, while a South African delegation will be in Cyprus early next week to present their bid to visiting FIA officials that want an African event to return to the calendar.
