Hyundai Motorsport

Hyundai Motorsport
Full name Hyundai Shell World Rally Team
Base Germany Alzenau, Germany
Team principal(s) Michel Nandan
Technical director Alain Penasse
Drivers Belgium Thierry Neuville,
Spain Dani Sordo,
New Zealand Hayden Paddon,
Netherlands Kevin Abbring
Co-drivers Belgium Nicolas Gilsoul,
Spain Marc Martí,
New Zealand John Kennard,
United Kingdom Sebastian Marshall
Chassis Hyundai i20
Tyres Michelin
World Rally Championship career
Debut 2000
Constructors' Championships 0
Drivers' Championships 0
Rally wins 1
Hyundai Motor Group sports
Football (Men's) Football (Women's) Baseball
Volleyball (Men's) Volleyball (Women's) Basketball
Archery (Men's) Archery (Women's) Motorsport
Alister McRae driving an Accent WRC at the 2001 Rally Finland.

Hyundai Motorsport began when Hyundai competed in the F2 class of the World Rally Championship in 1998 and 1999. It was run by British company Motor Sports Development (MSD), with David Whitehead as team principal. In September 1999, Hyundai unveiled the Accent WRC, a World Rally Car based on the Hyundai Accent. The Hyundai World Rally Team debuted the car at the 2000 Swedish Rally and achieved their first top-ten result at that year's Rally Argentina, when Alister McRae and Kenneth Eriksson finished seventh and eighth, respectively. Eriksson later drove the car to fifth place in New Zealand and fourth in Australia. In 2001, Hyundai debuted a new evolution of the Accent WRC, which was intended to improve reliability, but the performance of the car was still not good enough to challenge the four big teams (Ford World Rally Team, Mitsubishi, Peugeot and Subaru). However, at the season-ending Rally GB, the team achieved their best result with McRae finishing fourth and Eriksson sixth.

For the 2002 season, Hyundai hired the four-time world champion Juha Kankkunen, along with Freddy Loix and Armin Schwarz. Kankkunen's fifth place in New Zealand was the team's best result, but they managed to edge out Škoda and Mitsubishi by one point in the battle for fourth place in the manufacturers' world championship. In September 2003, after a season hampered by budget constraints, Hyundai announced their withdrawal from the WRC ending the partnership with MSD, and planning to return in 2006.[1]

Hyundai announced at the 2012 Paris Motor Show that they would be returning to the WRC for 2014, using the i20 model built to World Rally Car specifications. Hyundai also announced that their official test drivers for 2013 would be Juho Hänninen, Bryan Bouffier and Chris Atkinson.

On the 19th of December, 2012 Hyundai Motorsport GmbH was established in Alzenau, Germany, as responsible for Hyundai’s global motorsport activities and primarily for its World Rally Championship programme.

Thierry Neuville was confirmed as lead driver of Hyundai Motorsport's World Rally Championship programme from 2014. Neuville, along with his co-driver Nicolas Gilsoul, will pilot Hyundai’s new i20 WRC in all 13 WRC events in 2014, beginning with the team’s debut at the Monte-Carlo Rally in January. Thierry Neuville was the first driver that scored a top-three finish for Hyundai in the WRC. He ended third in Rally Guanajuato México 2014.[2] He and Hyundai also won their very 1st rally at that years' ADAC Rallye Deutschland.

2L-MC era (1998–1999)

Year Car Driver 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 2L MC Points
1998 Hyundai Coupé Kit Car Sweden Kenneth Eriksson MON SWE KEN POR
Ret
ESP
7
FRA ARG
Ret
GRE
Ret
5th 17
Hyundai Coupé Kit Car Evo2 NZL
3
FIN
Ret
ITA
Ret
AUS
3
GBR
Ret
Hyundai Coupé Kit Car Australia Wayne Bell MON SWE KEN POR
4
ESP FRA ARG GRE
Ret
Hyundai Coupé Kit Car Evo2 NZL
Ret
FIN
Ret
ITA
Ret
AUS
Ret
GBR
Ret
Hyundai Coupé Kit Car United Kingdom Alister McRae MON SWE KEN POR ESP
6
FRA
5
ARG GRE NZL FIN ITA AUS GBR
1999 Hyundai Coupé Kit Car Evo2 Sweden Kenneth Eriksson MON SWE
Ret
KEN POR
2
ESP
Ret
FRA ARG GRE
1
NZL
1
FIN
Ret
CHN
2
ITA
Ret
AUS
1
GBR 2nd 95
United Kingdom Alister McRae MON SWE
Ret
KEN POR
1
ESP
Ret
FRA ARG GRE
Ret
NZL
2
FIN
3
CHN
1
ITA
Ret
AUS
3
GBR
Ret

WRC era

Year Entrant Car No Driver 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 WDC Points WMC Points
2000 Hyundai Castrol World Rally Team Hyundai Accent WRC 14 Sweden Kenneth Eriksson MON SWE
13
KEN POR
Ret
ESP
23
ARG
8
GRE
Ret
NZL
5
FIN
15
CYP FRA
Ret
ITA
45
AUS
4
GBR
Ret
11th 5 7th 8
15 United Kingdom Alister McRae MON SWE
14
KEN POR
Ret
ESP
Ret
ARG
7
GRE
Ret
NZL
Ret
FIN
9
CYP FRA
12
ITA
16
AUS
Ret
GBR
11
0
15 Australia Michael Guest AUS
Ret
GBR 0
Hyundai Winfield Rally Team MON SWE KEN POR ESP ARG GRE NZL FIN
30
CYP FRA ITA
Ret
0
2001 Hyundai Castrol World Rally Team Hyundai Accent WRC2 9 Italy Piero Liatti MON
Ret
ESP
Ret
ITA
Ret
FRA
8
0 5th 17
Sweden Kenneth Eriksson SWE
8
POR
7
ARG
Ret
CYP
Ret
GRE
Ret
KEN FIN
12
NZL
10
AUS
12
GBR
6
21st 1
10 United Kingdom Alister McRae MON
7
SWE
Ret
POR
6
ESP
11
ARG
9
CYP
7
GRE
15
KEN FIN
13
NZL
9
ITA
Ret
FRA
9
AUS
10
GBR
4
17th 4
20 Italy Piero Liatti SWE POR ARG CYP
Ret
GRE KEN GBR
Ret
0
Finland Juha Kankkunen MON ESP FIN
Ret
NZL ITA FRA AUS 0
2002 Hyundai Castrol World Rally Team Hyundai Accent WRC3 17 Germany Armin Schwarz MON
Ret
SWE
Ret
FRA
13
ESP
16
CYP
7
ARG
Ret
GRE
9
KEN
Ret
FIN
13
GER
Ret
ITA
Ret
NZL
10
AUS
Ret
GBR
Ret
0 4th 10
18 Belgium Freddy Loix MON
Ret
SWE
Ret
FRA
9
ESP
10
CYP
Ret
ARG
Ret
GRE
Ret
KEN
Ret
FIN
9
GER
Ret
ITA
28
NZL
6
AUS
Ret
GBR
8
17th 1
19 Finland Juha Kankkunen MON SWE
8
ESP CYP
Ret
ARG
7
GRE
Ret
KEN
8
FIN
Ret
GER ITA NZL
5
AUS
Ret
GBR
9
14th 2
Poland Tomasz Kuchar FRA
Ret
0
27 MON SWE ESP CYP
14
ARG GRE KEN FIN GER ITA NZL AUS GBR 0
2003 Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai Accent WRC3 10 Germany Armin Schwarz MON
8
SWE
13
TUR
Ret
NZL
Ret
ARG
Ret
GRE
Ret
CYP
7
GER
12
FIN
12
AUS
13
ITA FRA ESP GBR 15th 3 6th 12
11 Belgium Freddy Loix MON
Ret
SWE
10
TUR
10
NZL
Ret
ARG
Ret
GRE
Ret
CYP
Ret
GER
11
FIN
10
AUS
8
ITA FRA ESP GBR 13th* 4*
11 Finland Jussi Välimäki MON SWE
Ret
TUR NZL
Ret
ARG GRE
Ret
FIN
Ret
AUS ITA FRA ESP GBR 0
United Kingdom Justin Dale CYP
Ret
0
Austria Manfred Stohl GER
18
19th* 2*
25 United Kingdom Justin Dale MON SWE TUR NZL ARG GRE GER
28
FIN AUS ITA FRA ESP GBR 0
2014 Hyundai Shell World Rally Team Hyundai i20 WRC 7 Belgium Thierry Neuville MON
Ret
SWE
28
MEX
3
POR
7
ARG
5
ITA
16
POL
3
FIN
Ret
GER
1
AUS
7
FRA
8
ESP
6
GBR
4
6th 105 4th 187
8 Spain Daniel Sordo MON
Ret
ARG
Ret
GER
2
FRA
4
ESP
5
10th 40
Finland Juho Hänninen SWE
19
POR
8
ITA
Ret
POL
6
FIN
6
GBR
26
13th 20
Australia Chris Atkinson MEX
7
AUS
10
18th 7
Hyundai Motorsport N 20 Spain Daniel Sordo POR
Ret
0 7th 28
New Zealand Hayden Paddon ITA
12
POL
8
FIN
8
AUS
6
ESP
9
GBR
10
14th 19
France Bryan Bouffier GER
Ret
FRA
9
12th* 20*

References

External links