German team ALL-INKL.COM Muennich Motorsport will compete in all 12 rounds of this year’s FIA World Rallycross Championship presented by Monster Energy with two self-developed Audi S3 RX Supercars. The team, which is owned by renowned World Touring Car driver Rene Muennich, will use 2015 as a development year in a bid to fight for the World RX Teams’ Championship title in 2016.
Muennich made his long-awaited debut in the Audi S3 RX Supercar at last year’s World RX of Germany but since then the Saxony-based team has made a number of changes to the car based on its performance in Estering and also at Franciacorta for the Italian RX round. It is still to be confirmed who will drive for the team but several drivers are expected to test the Audi S3 over the next few weeks.
“World RX will be our main programme this year,” confirmed team owner Muennich. “We will use this year to learn and then we want to fight for the title in 2016. We are pleased about the development of rallycross as a sport and the fact that we can develop our own car is what makes this Championship so special. Even without a strong result in Germany, we saw that our car is fast enough to score a top ten placing and it was interesting to see how the requirements for the cars change as a result of some of the circuits. The top speed on the World RX tracks is high and the grip is much better so we need to adapt the car accordingly.”
Muennich continued: “We have a different engine in the car since Estering as well as a new gearbox, new differentials and brakes. We also changed the geometry of the rear axle and have a new weight balance. It’s basically a completely new car. Our team has grown to more than 20 people and we will have more engineers and mechanics this year to help with the development of the cars. The line-up of competitors such as [Petter] Solberg will make this year very challenging for us but we’re very excited to be competing in World RX full-time and can’t wait to get started.”
Muennich Motorsport is the second all-new World Championship team to confirm its participation in this year’s World RX. The season kicks off with World RX of Portugal at the end of April.
source: fiaworldrallycross.com
